The Container Store opened its first D.C. location March 6 in a 26,000-square-foot space in the former Sears/Hechinger building on Wisconsin Avenue. Roadside Development is overseeing the $95 million mixed use renovation project, which also includes a Best Buy…Columbia, Md.-based Rouse Co. plans to purchase downtown Providence, R.I.'s Providence Place (below) for $522 million. Owned by Providence Place Group Ltd. Partnership, the five-year-old, 1.3 million-square-foot regional mall is anchored by Nordstrom, Filene's, Lord & Taylor and an IMAX theater…The Collection at Chevy Chase, a 100,000-square-foot, two-story streetfront retail project along Wisconsin Avenue in the Maryland suburb is asking for rents up to an unprecedented $150 a square foot, according to the Washington Business Journal. (Up to now, the highest known rent was $120 a square foot Krispy Kreme reportedly paid for its 1,000-square-foot space at Dupont Circle.) The developer is Chevy Chase Land Co. and the architect is Obata + Kassabaum…B. Green & Co. and Black Oak Associates have purchased and plan to develop a northeast Baltimore community center. When completed, the $6 million to $10 million project — to be called Belair Edison Crossing — will include a mix of stores, including a 35,000-square foot B. Green wholesale food service. KLNB Retail of Baltimore will coordinate leasing…Pier 1 Imports signed a lease with Erwin L. Greenberg Commercial Co. for 10,453 square feet of space at The Village at Waugh Chapel in Gambrills, Md., bringing the 340,000-square-foot retail portion of the mixed-use project to 100 percent occupancy. Other anchors include Safeway, Marshalls And Eckerd Drug…Greenberg Commercial plans more than $15 million in improvements at the former Englar Shopping Center and Lowe's site in Westminster, Md. When completed in the fall of 2004, the center, to be renamed Westminister Crossing, will feature 225,000-square-feet of retailers, including big-box chains new to the area. KLNB is leasing…Harris Teeter has signed a lease to open a supermarket in the Adams Morgan Section of Washington, it's first in the area…Downtown Norfolk has become more popular and prosperous over the past five years, according to the Downtown Norfolk Council and the Downtown Norfolk Business Improvement District. In a survey, residents from Williamsburg to Virginia Beach said they visit downtown three times more often than they used to — from an average of 30 trips last year compared to nine trips in 1999…The five-star Mandarin Oriental surprised Washingtonians with its choice of a southwest Washington location as the site for it's first area hotel. The chain is betting this undeveloped waterfront area will be remade, much like Baltimore's Inner Harbor… MB Property Corp., owner of the Rotunda in North Baltimore, hired MacKenzie Commercial Real Estate Services LLC to replace competitor Manekin LLC to reposition the mall portion of the aging development.
For more on the Mid-Atlantic region, see page 46 for our market profile of Richmond, Va.