New Balance expands Brighton holdings! | Harvard sells Brighton Mills!
Anthony D'Isidoro
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New Balance has bought a vacant property at 155 N. Beacon St. in Brighton next to its Boston Landing complex.
By Grant Welker – Reporter, Boston Business Journal
Oct 28, 2025
New Balance’s property development arm has paid $35 million for a 3-acre site next to its Boston Landing property in Brighton.
The vacant site is permitted for a 409,000-square-foot life sciences building, though it isn’t clear if plans are still in place for that use. Demand for lab space in the Boston area has come nowhere close to the amount of new buildings completed in the last few years.
The area’s life sciences vacancy rate is 28%, according to CBRE, and some 20 lab buildings are empty — including one in Boston Landing, a building named Forum with 350,000 square feet.
New Balance didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment on Tuesday.
The property at 155 N. Beacon St. was owned by IQHQ, a life sciences developer that’s also building the Alewife Park life sciences cluster in Cambridge and a lab building on Brookline Avenue near Fenway Park.
IQHQ paid $50 million for the site in 2021, making its sale this month a substantial loss. The firm sold to New Balance earlier this year a similarly sized lot a few blocks down, 103 N. Beacon, where it has permitting for a 265,000-square-foot building with lab and retail uses. That deal closed for $17.5 million, also a loss for IQHQ from its previous price.
The site at 155 N. Beacon most recently included a two-story office building and an auto body shop, both of which IQHQ demolished. IQHQ had planned the development, called 4 Life, to include ground-floor retail, dining and a courtyard, among other features.
New Balance’s Boston Landing project has turned a largely industrial stretch of Brighton into a new mixed-use neighborhood with its own commuter rail stop on the Framingham/Worcester line.
It includes New Balance’s headquarters office, practice facilities for the Bruins and Celtics, the Roadrunner concert venue, an apartment building and a track-and-field facility. A final piece, the 170-bed Strider Hotel, is under construction.
The new Boston Landing commuter rail stop, which opened in 2017, has also attracted new development on adjacent blocks, including the Allston Yards development, whose first phase with a new Stop & Shop grocery store opened last year.
Justin Brown
Hello Everyone,
If you remember NB Development purchased 103 North Beacon St from IQHQ for $17 million in late 2024. IQHQ bought the property for $27 million in 2021.
Now 155 North Beacon St.
Both transactions could be very positive for the community given that IQHQ was reluctant to proceed as life science projects and I'm sure New Balance Development will explore alternative uses for the sites.
Also today, Banker & Tradesman is reporting that Harvard has sold Brighton Mills to a Retail REIT who owns regional shopping centers in Everett and Framingham.
Tony
New Balance expands Brighton holdings
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New Balance has bought a vacant property at 155 N. Beacon St. in Brighton next to its Boston Landing complex.
<image002.png>
By Grant Welker – Reporter, Boston Business Journal
Oct 28, 2025
New Balance’s property development arm has paid $35 million for a 3-acre site next to its Boston Landing property in Brighton.
The vacant site is permitted for a 409,000-square-foot life sciences building, though it isn’t clear if plans are still in place for that use. Demand for lab space in the Boston area has come nowhere close to the amount of new buildings completed in the last few years.
The area’s life sciences vacancy rate is 28%, according to CBRE, and some 20 lab buildings are empty — including one in Boston Landing, a building named Forum with 350,000 square feet.
New Balance didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment on Tuesday.
The property at 155 N. Beacon St. was owned by IQHQ, a life sciences developer that’s also building the Alewife Park life sciences cluster in Cambridge and a lab building on Brookline Avenue near Fenway Park.
IQHQ paid $50 million for the site in 2021, making its sale this month a substantial loss. The firm sold to New Balance earlier this year a similarly sized lot a few blocks down, 103 N. Beacon, where it has permitting for a 265,000-square-foot building with lab and retail uses. That deal closed for $17.5 million, also a loss for IQHQ from its previous price.
The site at 155 N. Beacon most recently included a two-story office building and an auto body shop, both of which IQHQ demolished. IQHQ had planned the development, called 4 Life, to include ground-floor retail, dining and a courtyard, among other features.
New Balance’s Boston Landing project has turned a largely industrial stretch of Brighton into a new mixed-use neighborhood with its own commuter rail stop on the Framingham/Worcester line.
It includes New Balance’s headquarters office, practice facilities for the Bruins and Celtics, the Roadrunner concert venue, an apartment building and a track-and-field facility. A final piece, the 170-bed Strider Hotel, is under construction.
The new Boston Landing commuter rail stop, which opened in 2017, has also attracted new development on adjacent blocks, including the Allston Yards development, whose first phase with a new Stop & Shop grocery store opened last year.
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