Columbia Lease Opens Door to Another Build

The college signed a 10-year lease for 34,000 sf in the building, north of the core campus that includes 11 buildings along Michigan and Wabash, from Congress to Roosevelt. The college will put ancillary services, such as administrative workers, on floors seven through nine.

"We have to maximize the space for the college main campus," a college spokeswoman tells GlobeSt.com. "The main thing we're supposed to be doing is teaching students. Because we continue to grow, we continue to need more classroom space."

The college has also generated a little negative press recently, with the announcement that it is forcing blues king Buddy Guy to shut his nightclub Legends. The college owns the building, and has been trying to move out Guy from the two-story building on Eighth and Wabash that he's occupied since 1989. The college plans a 14-story dorm on the site.

"The land was donated to us in 1999, and they were grandfathered into the lease," the spokeswoman says. "At the time we made it clear that we were razing the building. At that time Buddy said he had no place to go, so we signed another two-year lease that expires May 31. We're trying to be flexible."

Also, the college recently selected four architecture firms to interview for a design commission for the college's proposed 42,000-sf media production center. The building will be built at the southwest corner of 16th Street and State on a vacant lot currently owned by the city of Chicago. The design will preserve a 25-foot arch from the facade of the current building at 1327 S. Wabash that bears the inscription "Famous Players Lasky Corp.," the parent company of Paramount Pictures.

US Equities represented Columbia in the recent lease. The spokeswoman says she could not reveal the lease rate, and most brokers don't keep data on the South Loop. The building owner will be providing rehab and build-out for the space. She also did not say how much the college is spending in its expansion plans, though she said it will be a multimillion project.