WASHINGTON, DC-CityCenterDC developers have inked a lease with Covington & Burling LLP for the law firm to take 420,000 square feet at the mixed-use development project underway in Downtown DC. The parties signed a letter of intent for the lease earlier this year. With the Covington lease in hand, the office buildings, One and Two CityCenter, are now more than 80% pre-leased, according to the project's developers, Hines, Archstone and the TFI US Real Estate Fund.

Covington is moving into its new space in the summer of 2014. The lease will run 20 years, during which time Covington will have options to expand. Thomas Fulcher and Arthur Greenberg with Studley and Debra Lehman-Smith and James McLeish with Lehman Smith McLeish advised Covington on the lease. Construction on Phase 1 of the 10-acre project began in March 2011 and parts of it are close to topping out. Two office buildings, two apartment buildings and two condominiums are expected to be able to accept first occupants by Q4 2013.

Construction of Phase II of the project is expected to begin in the first half of '14. It will consist of an approximately 370-room luxury hotel and 73,000 square feet of additional retail. All together, phases I and II of the project will contain more than 295,000-square-feet of retail space and 520,000 square feet of office space in seven buildings. There will be 458 rental apartment units, 216 condominium units, the hotel component, a public park, a central plaza and pedestrian-oriented streets and alleyways.

The project is delivering as Washington, DC is grappling with a downturn in demand for office space. In its favor, though, is its prime location and the fact that it is new. Of the tenants that are leasing space, Fulcher told GlobeSt.com in an earlier interview, they are clearly interested in new buildings.