Commercial Real Estate & Advisory

British Nightclub to Bow on Far West Side

By Adrianne Pasquarelli | September 14, 2010

Manchester’s-own Sankeys will open in former parking lot at West 50th and West Side Highway in space big enough for 1,100 patrons; area nightclub lite.

Hell’s Kitchen is getting a fresh jolt of nightlife from across the pond. Sankeys, a wildly popular nightclub in Manchester, England, is making its New York City debut with a 16,000-square-foot location at 637 W. 50th St., at the West Side Highway.

The company, which hopes to open as many as five other locations around the world soon, signed a 15-year lease for 6,000 square feet on the ground and 10,000 square feet on the second floor. Asking rent for the ground floor was $120 a square foot.

“The area is not overly saturated with nightclubs, so it’s not impossible to get a liquor license,” says ALEX BAUMOL, the Sinvin Real Estate broker who represented both Sankeys and landlord, Citigrant Funding Corp. He added that the building, a former parking garage, has an open layout with few columns, which should make construction easy.

Sankeys, whose colorful past includes two separate closures and re-openings since its 1994 founding, is expected to open in New York in early 2011. The club will have a capacity of up to 1,100 people.