The first phase of Under Armour’s new Baltimore Headquarters has officially been revealed. The plans were shown to Baltimore’s Urban Design and Architecture Review Panel, Bizjournals.com reports.
Included in the first phase are two office buildings and a 1,500-space parking garage. The garage will provide over 306,000 sf across 11 floors. Three of the floors will be set aside for use by visitors with the remaining eight used for employees.
The office buildings will hold 1,500 employees, though it is not yet known which divisions or departments these employees will come from, and will sit on vacant land near a closed Sam’s Club that has been converted to Under Armour offices.
Some members of the panel were worried the first phase’s parking garage, which could measure 120-feet tall and 800-feet wide, will be too large and “monolithic.” One panelist suggested splitting the building into two or redesigning the façade and staggering it in order to break up the huge building. Another panelist was worried the garage would block public access to the nearby Ferry Bar Park.
While the overall cost of the project is unknown and details are still sparse, what is known is that the new headquarters will reside in the $5.5 billion redevelopment of Port Covington, which will total around 4 million sf.
Sagamore Development Co., the private real estate arm of Kevin Plank, Under Armour’s CEO, is developing the campus and the surrounding infrastructure of Port Covington. In order to help pay for the infrastructure of the Port Covington project, Sagamore has received $660 million in tax-increment financing. Sagamore will reimburse the city for the bonds via taxes in the future.
A 100,000-sf manufacturing plant, field house, park, and 3 million sf of office space will all be included in the Port Covington development.
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