Ahead of its march toward a public offering, WeWork continues to gobble up space in Chicago with an anchor lease in the Fulton Market District.
The co-working firm, which was valued at $47 billion earlier this year, signed a lease for 90,000 square feet between two former industrial buildings at 1155 W. Fulton Market, according to Crain’s. It is WeWork’s third location in the Fulton Market District and its 13th in the city. With the deal, WeWork now controls well over 1 million square feet of space in Chicago.
A joint venture of Domus Group and Barnett Capital purchased the two properties separately earlier this year and are now renovating them for creative office. The work is expected to wrap by the end of the year.
WeWork’s lease is for the second, third, and fourth floors of the low-rise buildings and accounts for nearly all of the 100,000 square feet of rentable square footage there.
WeWork rebranded as the We Company in January, but its co-working locations still bear the name WeWork. The rebranding and the push in Chicago comes on the edge of an expected IPO later this year.
An IPO could come as early as next month.
The lease is the fourth for the firm this year in Chicago. In April it signed for one of its other Fulton Market locations and a location in the Loop.
In June WeWork topped 1 million square feet of space in Downtown Chicago with a lease for the top three floors at White Oak Realty Partners and CA Office’s under-construction spec office on W. Adams Street.
WeWork is the largest office tenant in Central London and Manhattan. [Crain’s] — Dennis Lynch