Union Finances Cohen's 400,000-SF Red Building

WEST HOLLYWOOD, CA-New York City-based developer Charles S. Cohen has agreed to employ 100% union labor in the construction of Cohen’s 400,000-sf, $100-million-plus Red Building office project in a deal with the Building and Construction Trades Council of Los Angeles and Orange counties. As part of the deal, the Union Labor Life Insurance Co. will provide construction and permanent financing for the office project, which is the third and final building planned at the landmark Pacific Design Center campus.

Cohen broke ground last year on the Red Building, a class A office project that will join the Blue and Green buildings at the 14-acre Pacific Design Center site at 8687 Melrose Ave. The development of the Red Building, which is scheduled to be completed in 2010, will create up to 1,933 new construction-related union jobs.

The deal with the trade unions is the latest in a series of steps that Cohen has implemented to expand and upgrade the Pacific Design Center since acquiring it. A $45-million repositioning and renovation program at the design center, for example, has targeted prestigious high-end interior design showrooms that once occupied the center but had left for storefront locations elsewhere.