A three-story building on Seattle’s waterfront made famous 27 years ago by seven strangers on MTV’s “The Real World” has a new owner.
Landmark Event Co. President Dru Agarwal told The Seattle Times he purchased Pier 70 for $11 million on Wednesday. He intends to build out a space for the AI2 Incubator, a for-profit investment fund for artificial intelligence startups born from the Allen Institute, which will be Pier 70’s anchor tenant.
Agarwal also plans to keep the current retail and office tenants, which fill out a little less than 40% of the building.
Landmark’s real estate portfolio is already outfitted with historic and unique Seattle properties that Agarwal has purchased and revitalized. It runs the MV Skansonia, a ferry-turned-event venue on Lake Union, as well as the Fremont Foundry, a former metal foundry that’s also an event venue now. The Fremont Foundry was built by Seattle artist Peter Bevis who brought the bronze Lenin statue to the neighborhood.
“We basically have this reputation of taking on these old Seattle properties that aren’t traditional and figuring out the best use for them and preserving them,” Agarwal said. “You have to have a long-term perspective. You have to invest in it as if you’re going to own it forever.”
The pier played host to the seventh season of MTV’s long-running reality TV series, “The Real World.” That first Seattle installment aired in 1998, toward the end of the city’s boom in pop culture relevancy.