Lion's Gate Seeks Approval for Mixed-Use Project

SARASOTA, FL-Lion’s Gate Development is seeking approval for the Proscenium, a mixed-use development that will include a 225-room hotel, 800-seat performing arts center, 125 residential units, 50 loft residential units, 230,000 sf of office and 130,000 sf of retail. The project will be located on two city blocks with the east and wide sides bounded by US 41 and Coconut Avenue and the north and south sides bounded by Boulevard of the Arts and Fourth Street. The hotel will contain 35,000 sf of ballroom, meeting and exhibition space and 50 hotel-branded residences.

Lion’s Gate has met with city commissioners regarding the project and will be conducting charettes with city staff, followed by meetings with the Sarasota Development Review Committee and neighborhood groups. The residential units will be for sale. Sales and marketing efforts for the project have not yet started, Lion’s Gate Development co-partner Karen Cook tells GlobeSt.com.

The approval process is expected to last approximately one year, after which construction will begin, Cook says. “It’s extremely rare that you can assemble six acres of property Downtown with frontage on US 41,” she says. “The project will be a gateway into Downtown.”

The complex is expected to be completed in fall 2010. Architects on the project are New York-based Perkins Eastman and the locally based Lawson Group. “The emphasis of the project is a pedestrian-friendly mixed-use development,” says Lion’s Gate Development co-partner Gary Cook.


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