The landmark BankNote Building in Hunts Point has brought on a new leasing team to fill roughly 100,000 square feet of space inside the 405,000-square-foot former currency printing plant, with an eye toward nonprofits, schools and government agencies rather than typical office tenants. OPEN Impact Real Estate has been retained alongside JLL to lead leasing and marketing at the building, targeting mission-driven organizations that might otherwise struggle to afford Manhattan rents.
The leasing assignment is led by Stephen Powers of OPEN and Mitchell L. Konsker of JLL, according to citybiz. Powers isn’t new to the property — he previously helped reposition and lease the building during its early redevelopment, per the same report. “There are very few opportunities in New York City where you can find this combination of scale, character, infrastructure and mission,” Powers said, describing a space built to accommodate large organizations but priced well below what they’d pay across the river.
Konsker struck a similar note, saying the building combines large-organization scale and infrastructure with a mission-driven tenant community. Available space includes roughly 75,000 contiguous square feet plus an additional 25,000 square feet that can be combined into a campus setup — a configuration ownership believes could suit a school or educational operator looking for room to grow. Ownership is also exploring a turnkey leasing program intended to make access to space easier and more efficient.
From Currency Vault to Community Campus
The building at the center of this push has a layered history. Constructed in 1909 as the American Bank Note Company’s headquarters and printing facility, the steel-framed, Gothic-inspired complex was designed by architects Kirby, Petit & Green, who built it with large windows, a sawtooth roof and a nine-story tower for the company’s secure printing operations, according to the Historic Districts Council. The same architectural firm had designed the company’s original Manhattan headquarters at 70 Broad Street a year earlier in 1908, a neoclassical low-rise that was separately designated a city landmark in 1997, per Wikipedia. Hoodline previously reported on that FiDi building’s foreclosure sale.
The Bronx plant is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission designated it an individual city landmark on February 5, 2008, after new ownership sought to reposition the long-vacant industrial property, the Historic Districts Council notes. A landscape redesign by Mathews Nielsen Landscape Architects unearthed a below-grade vault once used to store currency plates and preserved a historic chimney that had vented more than 200 original printing presses, according to MNLA. The building was also honored with the 2026 BOMA New York Pinnacle Award in the historical building category, citybiz reports.
Two Decades of Ownership Changes
The building’s modern transformation traces back to 2007, when Taconic Investment Partners purchased the facility for $32.5 million and invested an estimated $37 million converting industrial floors into office space for nonprofits and public agencies, according to The Real Deal. By September 2014, after leasing up more than 90% of the building, Taconic sold it to a joint venture of Perella Weinberg Partners and Madison Marquette for $114 million.
Today the building houses tenants including the New York City Human Resources Administration, the New York City School Construction Authority, Fedcap Rehabilitation Services, America Works and the Hunts Point Alliance for Children, along with congressional and other government offices, additional nonprofits, educational institutions and community-serving enterprises, per citybiz. Ownership is also evaluating an athletic facility for current occupants and future educational users on a ball field located directly across the street from the building, though the plan would be subject to required approvals from the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission.
Transit Upgrade Still Years Away
Part of the pitch to prospective tenants rests on transportation. A forthcoming Hunts Point Metro-North station is expected to improve the building’s connections to the Bronx, Manhattan, Westchester and Connecticut, under the MTA’s $3.1 billion Penn Station Access project extending the New Haven Line through the East Bronx along Amtrak’s Hell Gate Line to four new stations, according to the MTA. The project is designed to cut Bronx-to-Manhattan commutes by as much as 50 minutes once complete.
A 2030 completion estimate and Amtrak outage commitments have been reported for the project, City & State New York reported.
OPEN specializes in representing nonprofit, educational and government organizations and is certified as a woman-owned business; the firm formed a strategic alliance with JLL and serves as its exclusive woman-owned business enterprise partner in the tri-state region and a national affiliate. JLL, listed on the New York Stock Exchange, operates in more than 80 countries and brings a global platform and institutional leasing capabilities to the assignment, according to citybiz. Ownership says it intends to strengthen the building’s tenant community and cultivate long-term relationships as the leasing campaign moves forward.