CHICAGO—River North has hosted creative and tech-oriented firms for years, but many tenants there have begun looking for unconventional spaces on the periphery of downtown due to the submarket's low vacancy rate and escalating rents. And Larry Powers, a partner at Centrum Partners LLC, tells GlobeSt.com that it's time for Wicker Park to get its share of that business.

The company just sold the retail portion of Wicker Park Commons, located at the six-corner intersection of Ashland Ave., Milwaukee Ave. and Division St., but held onto the top four floors of the former Wieboldt's department store, and now envisions an office community there that will bring in tech and creative firms looking to attract a young workforce.

“We're going to market this property around the location,” Powers says. “Milwaukee Ave. is now hipster highway; sometimes in the morning you see more people going downtown on bikes than you see in cars.” There are many office users looking for collaborative offices spaces of more than 10,000 square feet, “and many of them live pretty close to this location and can get here without a car.”