A new tenant has stepped up to take the Bethesda Row space of Little Sesame, which said recently it has scrapped its planned store in the retail center.
U.K.-based paint maker Farrow & Ball plans by December to open a 1,183-square-foot showroom at 7118 Bethesda Lane, where it will be flanked by glassware retailer Simon Pearce and The Shade Store. It’s one of several new leases Federal Realty Investment Trust (NYSE: FRT) has signed since the start of the pandemic that have helped maintain nearly full occupancy in the downtown Bethesda development.
The space Farrow & Ball has claimed is the last spot of retail vacancy along Bethesda Lane, populated by restaurants and retailers including Johnny Was, Poke Dojo and Bluemercury. That meant there was plenty of interest from other tenants for the Little Sesame space, per Stuart Biel, senior vice president of regional leasing for Federal Realty.
“We try to be really judicious about finding first-to-market tenants or tenants that have only a few other stores in the area,” Biel said.
Little Sesame told Bethesda Beat in August it would not be moving forward with plans announced about a year earlier to open at Bethesda Row. It cited the “uncertain climate the pandemic afforded the restaurant industry as a whole” and said it would focus on its hummus factory in Prince George’s County and consolidate its restaurant operations to its L Street NW location.
Farrow & Ball also has a location in Wisconsin Avenue in Friendship Heights, though it plans to relocate from that space to Bethesda Row.
The substitution of Farrow & Ball for Little Sesame comes amid a larger refresh of Bethesda Row for Federal Realty in connection with the development’s 25th anniversary. That has included its common areas and a churn of older tenants with newer ones. Much of that has taken place without much downtime for the spaces being changed over, and there are several incoming tenants, including fish house chain The Salt Line, which plans to open next to ChiKo. The fast-casual Asian restaurant opened in early 2021 at 7280 Woodmont Ave.
Bethesda Row, with about 251,716 square feet of retail, was about 93% leased to a mix of tenants including Apple, Equinox and Anthropologie, according to Federal Realty’s second-quarter earnings supplement. The commercial real estate firm has inked several new deals in the past year with tenants including membership-based nail studio Glosslab, facial shop Heyday, bakeries Levain and maman and The Salt Line.
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