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Chapters may join luxury retailers on Alberni Street

Bookstore chain may take temporary space until it can find a 30,000-square-foot downtown Vancouver location
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Chapters is considering occupying the 18,000-square-foot second floor of 745 Thurlow Street, which is expected to be complete late summer | Bentall Kennedy rendering 

Chapters Indigo is interested in potentially joining a spate of new luxury retailers, including Strellson, at the corner of Thurlow and Alberni streets. 

Regardless of whether the bookstore moves to this or other space downtown, the future name of the bookstore will be Indigo, not Chapters. Other Chapters stores in Canada will similarly morph to become Indigo.

The company is leaving its 52,000-square-foot space at the corner of Robson and Howe Streets on May 30 and has committed to finding new permanent space later this year in what the company calls the “Robson shopping district.”

It wants that new permanent space to be in the 30,000-square-foot range.

One option that Chapters Indigo CEO Heather Reisman discussed at a public meeting on February 23 is to temporarily occupy the 16,000-square-foot second floor of Bentall Kennedy’s under-construction 745 Thurlow Street tower.

No offer has formally been made but it is a possibility, she said.

High-end Swiss menswear brand Strellson is the only confirmed retail tenant in the space, Bentall senior vice-president of Western Canada, Wayne Popowich told Business in Vancouver February 24.

Strellson will lease between 2,000 and 2,500 square feet on the Alberni side of that tower, which will not be complete until late summer. Two other retail units on the Thurlow side of the building total about 5,500 square feet.

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@GlenKorstrom