Jennifer Furniture has inked a lease for nearly 10,000 square feet at 655 Sixth Avenue — most of which is underground.
Most of the “affordable” furniture store’s new 8,500-square-foot space will be below grade, the New York Post reported. The store will only have 900 square feet at street level. Below-grade stores are fairly common for larger stores, but Jennifer needed some convincing from broker Jonathan Burke, of J.W. Burke & Company.
“Jonathan showed Jennifer’s team [menswear store] DXL Destination a few blocks away to show them how viable a basement selling space is,” Jack Laboz, co-principal of United American Land, which owns part of the building, told the Post.
The landmarked building, known as the O’Neill Building, was built in 1897. UAL owns the retail condo portion of the property, which spans 15,000 square feet. There are luxury apartments on the upper floors.
Jennifer’s new store is expected to open July 4 weekend and will replace a smaller Jennifer’s store at 902 Broadway. Asking rent for the lower level of the space was $60 per square foot. [NYP] —Kathryn Brenzel