TGS Plans for Low-Density Office Complex in Irvine

TGS Management is teeing up an eyebrow-raising office play in Orange County in the form of a low-density corporate compound in the Irvine Spectrum district.

The Fred Taylor-led quantitative hedge fund filed plans with the City of Irvine for a 207,395-square-foot office building on a 42-acre site north of the I-5 Freeway, the Orange County Business Journal reported. The firm bought the agricultural parcel north of Barranca Parkway from a FivePoint Holdings affiliate in 2023 for $240 million, marking one of the priciest land deals in the region. The new project is expected to push the firm’s total investment past $300 million.

The development has seemingly been in the works for years. Taylor formed Barranca Properties LLC, the entity controlling the land and leading development, in 2021.

The new offices will nearly double TGS’ current office space, an entire 115,000-square-foot building at the Irvine Company’s Spectrum Terrace office campus. The new office building is expected to rise two stories with one level of subterranean parking. The property is slated to feature amenities like a skate park, apool and sport courts as well as a 14,335-square-foot private recreation center.

Still, the proposed campus will be notably low-density compared to other office campuses including its current Spectrum Terrace home. Buildings are expected to cover 6.5 percent of the site, while a maximum of 65 percent is allowed. About two-thirds of the property is expected to hold landscaping, going far beyond the minimum 15 percent site coverage requirement for foliage.

TGS’ digs at Spectrum Terrace are similarly fenced off from other buildings at the campus. That facility has amenities like a rock-climbing wall, private gym and kitchen area for the approximately 100 employees that use the current offices there. That headcount is about one-fifth of the employee density that offices of that size typically can hold.

TGS hasn’t been focused entirely on expansion, however. Last year, TGS sold off two office buildings at 1 and 3 Banting in Irvine to Bridge Industrial for $60 million. TGS previously planned to redevelop the 165,000 square feet of vacant office space into a distribution complex.

— Chris Malone Méndez