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Nat Leventhal, president of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, gets calls on a regular basis from businesses and foundations that want to know whether the city's most important cultural institution has any office space to rent. It does not. "We may be looking for more space ourselves," Mr. Leventhal says.
Lincoln Center recently bought out the lease of a tenant in a West 65th Street building, which it will use for office space, and it's considering construction of a new performance facility on West 66th Street. "It's sort of a dream possibility," says Mr. Leventhal.
This is definitely the era of the possible for Lincoln Square, the neighborhood surrounding the world-renowned performing arts complex. Though it's been decades since the area was considered a slum, only recently has it been hyped as "New York's fastest-growing, most exciting business location," as Cushman & Wakefield Inc. claims in a brochure for a residential/office complex two blocks from Lincoln Center.
Lincoln Square is unlikely to become as sought-after as midtown, but the area's prestige and growing amenities are making it an attractive alternative to midtown south. The neighborhood has proved particularly appealing for music and entertainment companies, foundations and not-for-profits.
The ABCs of development
Many trace the change in Lincoln Square's fortunes back to 1989, when Capital Cities/ABC Inc. moved its corporate headquarters from 54th Street and Sixth Avenue to a location in the West 60s.
"If a company like...