The smallest of the four offices run by C.J. Segerstrom & Sons next to South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, the seven-story 3420 Bristol St., is getting a makeover designed to bring its appearance more in line with its high-rise brethren.
The midrise office, long known as the California Bank & Trust Building, is in the early stages of its largest design revamp since it opened in the late 1960s.
Plans call for the 66,835-square-foot building at the corner of Bristol and Sunflower Avenue to get a modern-looking shell, upgraded landscaping, patio space, and a new parking layout, according to city documents.
The entire first floor will be reconfigured to hold retail space rather than offices.
The ground floor will feature “floor-to-ceiling windows, modernized upscale touches, and accommodate a variety of space configurations,” property owners’ representatives said in a statement.
Costa Mesa-based C.J. Segerstrom & Sons, whose family-run business also owns and operates South Coast Plaza mall on the other side of Bristol, runs the property under the Office of South Coast Plaza banner.
The property’s long been overshadowed by the Office of South Coast Plaza’s other holdings in the vicinity: Plaza Tower, Center Tower and Park Tower, three of the city’s tallest and highest-end office buildings.
The three towers total more than 1.2 million square feet and house large law firms, accountants and other professional services firms as tenants.
Tenants at 3420 Bristol trend smaller, and the building commands less expensive rents than the three towers.
The largest occupant at 3420 Bristol is office-campus operator TechSpace Inc., an Aliso Viejo-based firm that offers smaller businesses flexible lease terms and ready-to-use technology.
TechSpace has occupied two floors there since 2012 and is about halfway through an 11-year lease, according to Chief Executive Vic Memenas. The firm has two Orange County locations and nearly a dozen locations nationwide.
Typical TechSpace tenants employ 10 to 20 people, and many have lease terms as short as six months.
It’s the only tenant leasing more than 10,000 square feet in the building, which is more than 90% occupied, according to CoStar Group Inc. records.
The building upgrades should be a selling point for TechSpace as it prepares to compete for small area tenants.
Fellow shared-space office landlord WeWork Inc. said last month that it will move into about 40,000 square feet of amenity-laden space at the nearby Pacific Arts Plaza office campus, which is owned by Newport Beach-based Irvine Co.
The changes coming to the Bristol Street building “will only make it more attractive” to smaller tenants seeking flexible office space, Memenas said. “You can’t beat the location; it really is located at Main and Main,” he said.
Philz and Grills
Architecture firm Shubin Donaldson, which has an office in Irvine, is heading the building’s design.
The property owners got city approvals for the project early this year; redevelopment work should wrap up around June.
The project’s cost wasn’t disclosed.
One ground-floor tenant has been announced for the new retail space: Philz Coffee, a hip San Francisco-based chain that currently has one OC location, at Huntington Beach’s Pacific City development. The coffee maker also has a Fullerton location in the works.
The remaining ground-floor space could be filled by retailers or a restaurant, a strategy the office owner has used for its nearby towers.
The ground floor of the 17-story Park Tower building includes one of the area’s most popular restaurants, Amar Santana’s Vaca, as well as a showroom for Fisher & Paykel Appliances Ltd., a New Zealand-based maker of upscale home appliances.
Cushman & Wakefield has the listing for the South Coast Office buildings. Leasing there is headed by the brokerage’s Robert Lambert, Rick Kaplan, Brian Booth and Jennifer Pelino Hill.
“We are also already fielding additional interest on more space, proving both the importance of these renovations along with the growing demand for this type of well-located, high quality and amenity-oriented mixed-use product,” Lambert said in a statement.
