Five years ago Wilson Meany Sullivan purchased the 26-story Pacific Telephone Building at 140 New Montgomery for $345 a square foot with plans to spend an additional $500 a square foot converting it from an office building to a five-star hotel and condominium tower, with a spa, restaurant and bar.
In 2008, the hotel component was dropped and new plans were floated for 135 condos on floors two to twenty-six over an 8,500 square foot restaurant on the ground floor.
Plans for any condo conversion have since been dropped, and as the Wall Street Journal notes, the office building will simply, but expensively, be upgraded and return targeting “tech start-ups, venture-capital firms and others.”
∙ Conversion Of 140 New Montgomery Moves To Environmental Review [SocketSite]
∙ Another Office To Hotel/Condo Conversion: 140 New Montgomery [SocketSite]
∙ New Call by Developer on Historic Tower [Wall Street Journal]
As long as it is used…the one thing I would love to see is the penthouse level be used for some sort of public access purpose. A Pacbell employee took me up there once years ago, and as i recall there is a wonderful auditorium space with great art deco detailing. Such a great building.
They seem to be trying very hard to top every bubble.
I’m very happy to hear this. With the very high demand for office space in SOMA, this is an excellent idea. I’ve always loved this building and very much want to see it return to usefulness.
curmudgeon – fantastic idea! Just peering through the windows at the lobby, you can see it has amazing deco details.
Good news. I really hope it is lit up at night again. It looked amazing.
Hmmm……isn’t Salesforce looking for a new headquarters?
There’s definitely more demand for office space than condos in SOMA. Maybe some of those unbuilt condos that have been shelved/delayed can be built as office space.
I love this building and can’t help but admire the details when I walk by it.
Having more office space in SOMA would be a godsend, we’re moving our 50 person company to the Mission because rents for 15k sq ft spaces in SOMA are prohibitively expensive at the moment.
This is one of my favorite buildings in the city – kind of a shame it’s not going condo. Of course, by the time they get it upgraded the bloom may be off the social media rose, so it might end up as a hotel anyway. IIRC the building has no attached parking.
Beautiful building, would be great to have it restored and used again.
Looks great from the St Regis residences… pity we won’t be able to wave at eachothers’ fanciness
I would never live in a building with such lack of windows. Once you get used to room-wide floor to ceiling windows you won’t go back!
Much better as office space.
it would have been a real loss for the building to be converted to condos in terms of the ability of more people over time to experience the beautiful interiors of the building
Hmmm……isn’t Salesforce looking for a new headquarters?
Salesforce just bought a building to meet its needs. They had plans to build new, but backed away because that would be too much hassle. If building brand new is too much hassle, then restoring an historic building is completely out of the question.
mole man
what did salesforce buy? I know zynga bought their bldg and Salesforce signed a big lease at 50 Fremont but a purchase….
Academy of Arts is looking for more office space.
UPDATE: Yelp Inks An Eight Year Lease For One-Third Of 140 New Montgomery