Expect to see the recently proposed Banc Hotel hospitality and office development in Irvine start to make its way through the city’s planning process next year, according to the ambitious project’s backers.
In the Aug. 13 edition of the Business Journal, I reported on early-stage development plans filed with Irvine’s planning department for a nine-story mixed-use project near the intersection of Jamboree Road and Michelson Drive, about a mile from John Wayne Airport.
The Banc Hotel project is envisioned to include a 234-room boutique hotel, which would be connected to an office building of about 167,000 square feet.
A number of retail and medical office features would also be part of the high-end development, which city records indicated was being headed by an affiliate of Irvine-based YLS Brands, a seller of Korean-made skincare and other lifestyle products. Company executives couldn’t be tracked down for comment prior to the story running.
Since then, I spoke with YLS Chief Executive John De Vries while he was in Asia for business. He said the proposed project is in fact being led by a different Irvine-based development group that he heads called HJ Capital Group.
That company, along with YLS, have recently taken up shop at an office location a short walk from the development site on Bardeen Avenue.
De Vries said his firm currently has two major financial backers—one in the U.S., the other in Asia—lined up for the project. The firm hasn’t yet closed on the roughly 6.2-acre site at 18582 Teller Ave. where it would be built but would do so once the entitlement process moves ahead.
HJ Capital is working with Irvine-based entitlement consultant Starpointe Ventures on the project.
Starpointe Principal Tim Strader Jr. said the work to get the master plan approved with the city will likely begin in earnest in the first quarter, and could take four to six months.
The Banc Hotel would be built on land between the just-built Boardwalk office development and the under-construction 2722 Michelson creative-office project, owned by Irvine-based LBA Realty and the future home of Oculus VR co-founder Palmer Luckey’s new defense technology startup, Anduril Industries Inc. Strader noted that HJ Capital’s project would be built where another multibuilding office project, California Green, was once envisioned.
In terms of total square footage built, “this would be far less intense” than California Green, whose entitlements were approved in 2007, Strader said.
In addition to providing updated images for Banc Hotel (see left), De Vries passed along new marketing materials for the project, which indicate a 10,000-square-foot spa, 20,000-square-foot fitness center, 9,000-square-foot food-centric marketplace, and a 24-lane bowling alley will be built.
The office tower portion would include a 12,000-square-foot in-vitro fertilization center, while the hotel’s rooms would start around 500 square feet and go up to 5,000 square feet for a few luxury suites.
Quiksilver Offering
A 4,566-square-foot retail building in downtown Laguna Beach is up for sale at an eye-opening price.
The national retail investment team of CBRE Group Inc. recently listed 249 and 255 Forest Ave., two connected sites in the Main Beach Village area.
About 68% of the property’s leased to Quiksilver Inc. for a retail store. The fully-occupied property’s monthly rents average about $5.89 per square foot, according to CBRE’s data.
The building is being offered for a little more than $7.6 million, or about $1,677 per square foot.
Only six retail sites in the city have traded hands for a higher per-square-foot price over the past decade, and none were as large as the Forrest Avenue property, according to CoStar Group Inc. records.
The red-brick property, refurbished in 1999, is owned by an entity with ties to Santa Ana-based Nexus Companies LLC, CoStar records show.
