Luxury retailer Coach, Inc. will become the first tenant in a tower that developers Related Companies and Oxford Properties Group, both of New York, plan to build on Midtown Manhattan’s West Side. Coach will occupy more than 600,000 square feet, or more than one-third of the initial tower of the Eastern Rail Yards, part of the 26-acre, mixed-use Hudson Yards site that the city hopes to develop. The 1.7-million-sq-ft, 51-story tower will generate more than 20,000 construction jobs, according to NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s office. When completed in 2015, the tower will be the largest commercial building in New York City. Construction is expected to start in mid 2012.

Rendering Courtesy of KPF

The Hudson Yards site is the single largest piece of undeveloped property in Manhattan. The tower, along with completion of a new park and the No. 7 subway line extension that will nearly reach the site, will have a “domino effect” on development of the rest of the proposed Hudson Yards, Bloomberg said in announcing the deal with other stakeholders and city officials earlier today at the site. Neither he nor the stakeholders detailed financing plans for the tower or the rest of the site.

The tower, located on the south side of the site, is part of a planned 5.5-million-sq-ft “superblock” building complex bound by 10^th Avenue, 33^rd Street, Hudson Boulevard and 30^th Street. Plans for the complex include a cultural facility, a five-star hotel, a public school, office space, residences, retail shops, as well as open space and access to the waterfront.

New York-based Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates designed the tower, which will be a LEED Gold building on the corner of 30^th Street and 10^th Avenue and bridge Chelsea and Hudson Yards. Coach will occupy the lower third of the commercial office space of the tower. Plans call for a vertical campus with a large atrium that will be the heart of Coach’s space and serve as the “visual anchor” of the High Line. Coach will relocate its world headquarters to the tower from 516 West 34^th Street.