$450M Entertainment Studio Project Planned in Hollywood

A joint venture between Bain Capital Real Estate and BARDAS Investment Group is planning a massive new $450 million entertainment studio in Hollywood. Echelon Studios sits on five acres and will include four 19,000-square-foot sound stages, a 15,000-square-foot flex stage, a 90,000-square-foot creative village and a 350,000-square-foot creative office in two buildings. The joint venture has submitted plans to the City of Los Angeles for the project.

The project signals the demand for quality studio and production space. In a statement, David Simon, founder and managing principal of BARDAS Investment Group, said that this project is well positioned to meet demand from the content creation market.

Located at 5601 Santa Monica Boulevard, Echelon Studios will also have best-in-class amenities, including restaurants, a central courtyard, collaboration areas and shared production space, outdoor common areas and filming spaces.

The joint venture formed in 2019 to target studio, production and creative office opportunities that will serve the media and content creation industry in the Los Angeles market. It is currently under construction on another production studio at 712 Seward. The 550,000 square-foot urban studio is the first “purpose-built urban studio campus property built in Hollywood in more than 20 years,” according to the joint venture. The partnership has a total pipeline of 1 million square feet.

New York City is also seeing a surge in entertainment studio demand, and like Los Angeles, content creation is behind the trend. Research from CBRE reveals strong demand in New York City for high-quality production space, which includes small broadcast studios in office buildings, raw space in warehouses and professional production facilities with insulated soundstages.

This year, there have been a number of high-profile studio leases deals. The top deals include Wildflower Studios and Netflix are building studio complexes in Queens and Brooklyn, and Lionsgate has leased a new studio complex currently under construction in Downtown Yonkers. All three companies are new arrivals to the market. Existing tenants are also expanding. Apple TV+ signed on to occupy 75,000 square feet of production space at Kaufman Astoria Studios, plus 15,000 square feet of office space at the property.