Freed Hosts New Urban Target Downtown

CHICAGO-Chicago will be one of the four test sites, and at this time the only city not on the West Coast, to open a new urban concept Target store next year, the company announced Tuesday. The retail chain has leased 125,000 square-feet in the former Carson Prairie Scott & Co. building at South State and Madison streets downtown.

Target officials announced the new store at the building, now known as the Sullivan Center and owned by locally-based Joseph Freed & Associates. The building has one million square feet, with about three-quarters used as office space. Target will have a 60,000 square foot sales floor, including groceries. The store will open in October 2012.

A spokeswoman tells GlobeSt.com that urban customers have been asking for more convenient locations. The other three new stores, dubbed CityTarget, will open next year in Seattle, Los Angeles and San Francisco, she says. "The stores will have a limited assortment of best-selling items, household basics and commodities suitable for urban households," the spokeswoman says.

The company has 10 regular-sized stores in the city, but is looking for more locations, the spokeswoman says. The Minneapolis-based department store retailer has opened stores in the Chicago area since 1993.

Larry Freed, president of the family firm, says once Target moves in, the proeprty will be 84% leased. Other tenants include Flat Top Grill, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Gensler architecture firm, City Year and the Illinois Department of Employment Security.

The building his considered a historic landmark, as it was designed by Louis Henri Sullivan and opened in 1899. Freed purchased the building in 2001, and has invested more than $190 million in renovations, even as key tenant Carson Prairie Scott vacated before their lease was up. Mayor Richard Daley said in a statement that the building is one of the city’s most architecturally significant buildings.