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In June, Duane Reade opened a 24-hour store at 40 Wall St. that offers standard drugstore items like cold remedies and hair conditioner, as well as more exotic items such as fresh fruit and sushi.
But the merchandise isn't the only thing that sets the store apart. The ubiquitous chain's 254th location in the city has a remarkable interior. The 22,000-square-foot space is graced by 28-foot ceilings, black marble columns, ornate archways and stately windows. In fact, this Duane Reade location, which had been vacant for 15 years, looks more like a classic bank than a drugstore, and with good reason: It was designed by architect H. Craig Severance in 1928 for the Bank of Manhattan Trust.
"Adapting and preserving an old building definitely drives up the costs," said John Yodice, Duane Reade's senior director of construction, who estimates the project's price tag was about a third higher than it otherwise would have been. "But you draw more people to a store like this because it is so aesthetically pleasing."
Additionally, despite the fact that the spaces can be difficult to reconfigure, light, and heat and cool, rents for them are comparable to those for plain-vanilla properties.
"The old banking spaces certainly present obstacles, be it restrictions on signage or cavernous structures or landmark issues, but they can command
competitive rents because they have a major presence," said Faith Hope Console', chairman of retail leasing and sales at Prudential Douglas Elliman. "They're in great locations, and there is a market for nontraditional retail space."
There are 32 bank buildings and 13 bank interiors with landmark designation in New York City.
A growing number of business-es, including grocers, restaurants and event planners, are moving into the city's elegant old bank buildings. Many are making the same calculation the original owners did--that the wow factor of these palazzo-like edifices will help justify the sizable expenditures they involve by turning heads and boosting sales.
In recent years, Trader Joe's has opened in a former Independence Savings Bank on Atlantic Avenue and Court Street in Brooklyn's Cobble Hill. Developer Seth Greenberg spent $5 million to turn a Bowery Savings Bank at 130 Bowery into a glittering special events spot, Capitale.
Cipriani did much the same thing with a...