Playhouse Plaza Inks New Deals, Hits 97% Occupancy

Co-working company Spaces and real-estate firm Compass have signed leases up to a total of 71,000 square feet at the Playhouse Plaza building at 680 E Colorado Blvd. in Pasadena.

The 155,000-square-foot, five-story Playhouse Plaza, completed in 2015, is located in the heart of the Playhouse District on the southeast corner of Colorado Boulevard and El Molino Avenue. The office building is within walking distance of numerous restaurants, shops, health clubs, and entertainment venues, including the historic Pasadena Playhouse for which it is named.

The Playhouse Plaza houses Alibaba Group, the Chinese e-commerce company, among other tenants.

Spaces inked an 11-year lease for 49,000 square feet, while Compass is leasing 22,250 square feet more in addition to the 12,000 square feet it has been renting since 2016, a report by The Real Deal Thursday said.

With Spaces and Compass in, the building, owned by IDS Real Estate Group, is now 97 percent leased, according to a statement by CBRE, which brokered the deal.

Spaces also leased 69,200 square feet at the Water Garden office campus in Santa Monica at the same time as the Pasadena deal, the report said. The company had earlier opened five Los Angeles County locations in the summer.

The Real Deal said co-working space in LA has grown by about 500 percent over the last 10 years. With several co-working firms currently racing to get space, LA has become the second-largest co-working market in the country, with a total of over four million square feet leased, according to the report.

Compass has been adding offices around the country and acquiring numerous brokerages over the past year, even as CEO Robert Reffkin said the company won’t be expanding to any new markets this year.

In October, Compass acquired Pacific Union International, becoming the largest independent real estate brokerage in California and the third largest in the country.