Fan Pier Developments | Seaport

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LouisBoston, a retail icon on Newbury Street in Boston, plans to relocate to Fan Pier on the South
Boston Waterfront. (George Schnee/Schnee Architects)

Boston Globe - October 16, 2009
LouisBoston heads to Fan Pier
Move could help attract more shops to developing area

By Jenn Abelson, Globe Staff | October 16, 2009

Back Bay fashionista LouisBoston is vacating its historic digs next spring for a spot on the waterfront at Fan Pier, making it the first retailer to sign on to the struggling project and leaving a big hole on Newbury Street for at least a year.

Owner Debi Greenberg, who took over the high-end designer business from her father in 2003, announced plans last year to move Louis from its stately building and create a new, edgier identity away from Newbury Street. She searched the South End and South Boston and settled on the Fan Pier location about five months ago.

?Luxury has been so commercialized, and it needs to be redefined. This new spot will offer customers a change in attitude, a more approachable space,?? Greenberg said yesterday at an event at Fan Pier to unveil the project. ?This new store will set the tone and personality for taking luxury into a new direction.??

The arrival of Louis to Fan Pier marks a major coup for the developers, who have faced financing challenges and had to scale back the project. Many merchants have long resisted the South Boston Waterfront, a largely undeveloped neighborhood cut off from the rest of the city. LouisBoston, with luxury brands, a restaurant, and premier stylist Mario Russo, is a shopping destination that could help attract additional shops, according to retail analysts and real estate experts.

?Someday it will be a great area. It?s been slowed down with the economy,?? said Andy LaGrega of Wilder Cos., a Boston development firm. ?But Louis will be a draw.??

The new, two-story, 20,000-square-foot LouisBoston will open next spring at the water?s edge, diagonally across from the Institute of Contemporary Art.

The shop, with a 10-year lease, is about half the size of the designer emporium?s location at Newbury and Berkeley streets.

Real estate specialists say Louis, which had a lease that was below market rates for the pricey Back Bay, probably scored a good deal at the Fan Pier site as one of the pioneer tenants.

Fan Pier developers declined to discuss rent details.

The Fan Pier store is being built on a site that was initially slated for a residential building. The developers anticipate moving forward with the residential piece once the market and financing rebound, and will then relocate Louis to another part of the development.

Fan Pier developer Joseph F. Fallon said he is hoping to sign leases for at least one restaurant and cafe in the coming weeks for the building where law firm Fish & Richardson is planning to move at One Marina Park Drive.

?We?re only just getting started here,?? Fallon said in an interview yesterday.

While LouisBoston?s move to South Boston is a big gain for the waterfront, its departure from the Back Bay will leave a massive vacancy for at least a year, according to WS Development, which runs the property.

Thomas DeSimone, a partner at WS Development, said rehabilitation work is needed for the interior and exterior of the building, home to the New England Museum of Natural History until the late 1940s. The building has not been marketed, and the improvements could take from a year or two years once Louis moves out.

?We hope that by the time the building is ready, the economy will bounce back and be more favorable,?? DeSimone said. ?This is a one-of-a-kind opportunity.??

Retail and real estate analysts expect a high-end merchant that is looking to break into Boston, such as Tommy Hilfiger or Bloomingdale?s, to take over the premier site ultimately.

?While LouisBoston moving to the waterfront will be a boost to the overall economic development of our city, the prime location of the Louis on Newbury and the beautiful architecture of that building would be a prize for any business owner,?? said Mayor Thomas M. Menino. ?The city along with the Boston Redevelopment Authority will continue to work hard in bringing new businesses to our retail districts.??

Jenn Abelson can be reached at abelson@globe.com.
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So perhaps this will become a district full of buildings with exterior stairways?
 
Of all the things they could have brought over from their Newbury St location, they decide to bring the lawn.

So has everyone else given up any hope of the Seaport being anything other than an exurban wasteland?
 
Hope isn't gone, it's just been put on hiatus for approximately 15 years.
 
It goes to show you how underdesigned the ICA really is...but do you think this type of temporary chic value engineering is the new wave of retail spacing? Did the PUMA Race inspire this Louis development?

And I like the rendering but dear god...wtf is up with the grassy lawn? This sort of minimalist dynamic is nice and it has a lot of potential for the area, if they choose to go that route...but you have to fill the gaps in better than that....
 
Why don't they just bring in a whole bunch of PUMA style shipping crates and build a new mall...........
 
Lawn in front of Louis may be the limit of where Harborwalk park space ends and private property begins. Or it may just be artistic license on the part of whoever made the drawing.
 
this likely won't happen or best case , won't last. LOUIS is not a destination retailer. The Louis customer will not go to the South Boston waterfront to shop
 
What a disaster. The Seaport is like a museum of shitty urban planning.
 
Maybe the 10 years this will set things back isn't necessarily a horrible thing. It's possible that by then the other developments in the area - whether the Massport parcels, the convention center hotels, or the Fort Point parcels along A street - will be bringing many more feet into the area. Fan Pier will be seen as important in-fill and developed naturally as opposed to some amorphous "destination", the vision of which has looked disasterous from day one.

In short: Fan Pier is dead. Celebrate?
 
Wow. "Luxury has become commercialized". My head just exploded.

This and the Seaport are so ugly, I can't imagine they're not plots to derail Boston's second pass at modern architecture.

With this and Kendall and Charles River Park and Government Center, shitty architectural spaces erected in the last 50 years now comprise at least as much of Boston as brick and cobblestone. Doesn't that say something?

"One Marina Park Drive". That is all.
 
Batterymarch said:
this likely won't happen or best case , won't last. LOUIS is not a destination retailer. The Louis customer will not go to the South Boston waterfront to shop
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Exactly....Saks, Neiman, and Barney's will all profit from their departure. I certainly never found that they caried anything unique enough to convince me that it merits a ride on the Silver Line. It was a nice landmark store, but ultimately not irreplacable and the owner seems out of touch with reality to think otherwise.

Louis Boston's owner Debi Greenberg said she has been wanting to move her store to the South Boston waterfront for a while but the rollercoaster real estate market kept her from signing a lease until now. The high-end retailer has been in its current location in the Back Bay since 1988.

"I've always sort of wanted to be right here," said Greenberg. "It doesn't scare me, as a matter of fact it gives me that much more cache."

Greenberg said she wanted to locate the store outside of a "mall-like atmosphere." She said she was excited to be a "pioneer" and said the store was designed to look like someone's "loft apartment with a lot of clothes in it."
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When I read the above, I re-read it twice, then checked the source to make sure I wasn't inadverantly reading The Onion.

It's her store, so best of luck, but I don't see this ending well.
 
With this and Kendall and Charles River Park and Government Center, shitty architectural spaces erected in the last 50 years now comprise at least as much of Boston as brick and cobblestone. Doesn't that say something?
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Hyperbole can be wonderful, but let's not overindulge. Forgetting for a moment that Kendall Sq isn't in Boston, the 80 acres that make up CRP, GC and Fan Pier hardly overwhelm the Back Bay, South End, Charlestown, Beacon Hill, etc. that comprises the other 60,000 acres of Boston.
 
Most of that 60,000 acres isn't built along the same lines as the Back Bay either. It's triple-deckers and one-story taxpayer commercial buildings. I barely consider it urban.

But of the core city that is indisputably urban, at least half is now postwar crap.
 
Fine, forget the "non-urban" parts of the city. Let's even forget about the South End, Downtown, Charlestown and most other urban parts of the city. The Back Bay alone (from Beacon to Boylston, From Mass Ave to Arlington) is 185 acres. The three neighborhoods you lament so dramatically are 80 acres.
 
Look at a map. The size of the Seaport District is almost the size of all of downtown Boston, including the North End. It is a giant parking lot.

'nuf said.
 
kennedy said:
Look at a map. The size of the Seaport District is almost the size of all of downtown Boston, including the North End. It is a giant parking lot.

'nuf said.
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You can also fit all of downtown boston and back bay into central park.
 
I'd call Allston Village 'urban' despite its low-rise character. Would you disagree?
 
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