Prada buys retail condo on Billionaires’ Row

Prada has snapped up a third Midtown property on one of the most coveted retail corners in the city.

The luxury brand bought a retail condo at 730 Fifth Avenue, the Crown Building, for $12.6 million from Brookfield Properties, according to property records.

The deal comes four months after Prada inked deals to buy its flagship store at 724 Fifth Avenue and neighboring 720 Fifth Avenue for a total of $835 million from Jeff Sutton’s Wharton Properties. However, it appears to have been part of that agreement: Sutton assigned a lease for the annex space for $12.6 million in December and then the deed changed hands for exactly the same amount on April 22, property records show.

Although the deed lists the seller as Brookfield, and a Brookfield executive signed the paperwork, sources told Crain’s that Wharton Properties was the actual seller.

It’s possible that they shared ownership of the property. In 2015, Sutton and mall company GGP, which Brookfield took control of three years later, paid $1.75 billion to purchase the Crown Building from the Spitzer and Winter families. Sutton sold the majority of his stake in the retail portion of the Crown Building to Brookfield in 2020.

Vlad Doronin’s OKO Group and developer Michael Shvo purchased the bulk of the building in 2015 for $475 million. In 2017, Shvo was sidelined from the project after being indicted on tax evasion charges, but retained an equity stake.

Two years later, OKO secured $750 million in financing to convert the upper portion of the building from office space to 22 luxury condos and an 83-room hotel under Doronin’s Aman Resorts brand.

The Billionaires’ Row condos have scored some of the city’s biggest sales in recent years.

Retail tenants include Bulgari, Mikimoto and Ermenegildo Zegna, according to Brookfield’s website. Swiss jeweler Chopard relocated its flagship store from Madison Avenue to the Crown Building the same year, paying an estimated $3.63 million for the first year’s rent of 2,422 square feet.

Sutton and Brookfield did not respond to requests for comment.

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