TF Cornerstone files plans for 370 resi units at former Cohen Brothers office building
135 East 57th Street (Credit - Google)
Tom and Fred Elghanayan’s TF Cornerstone submitted a major alteration application for the conversion of the 397,354-square-foot business (B) building at 135 East 57th Street in Midtown East, Manhattan, at the corner of Lexington Avenue into a mixed-use building with 370 residential units. The building was formerly owned by Cohen Brothers Realty and lost following a foreclosure action.
The developer filed the application with the New York City Department of Buildings on October 24, 2025 under job number M01304547. The plans call for a conversion of the 31-story building. The project is described in the filing as: Application filed to convert building to residential/mixed-use as per plans. Bruce Weill, executive vice president at TF Cornerstone, filed the application. The architect is CetraRuddy Architecture.
The plans call for between three and 20 apartments per floor on floors two through 31, as well as unnamed amenities. In addition, the plans call for four retail locations on the ground floor.
135 East 57th Street
| wdt_ID | wdt_created_by | wdt_created_at | wdt_last_edited_by | wdt_last_edited_at | floor | comment | description | persons_permitted | occupancy_label | zoning_use | dwelling_units |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Sub-Cellar - 2 | MECHANICAL EQUIPMENT ROOMS | Mechanical and/or electrical equipment room | 11 | Factory and Industrial | ||
| 2 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Sub-Cellar - 1 | ACCESSORY BUILDING STORAGE | Storage of non combustible Materials | 103 | Storage | ||
| 3 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Sub-Cellar - 1 | ACCESSORY BUILDING STORAGE | Storage of non combustible Materials | 5 | Storage | ||
| 4 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Cellar | SUPERINTENDENT OFFICE, WORKSHOP, STAFF LOCKER ROOM AND LOUNGE | Apartment | 14 | Residential | ||
| 5 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Cellar | ACCESSORY BUILDING STORAGE ROOMS | Storage of non combustible Materials | 82 | Storage | ||
| 6 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Cellar | JANITOR SUPPLY AND CLEANING EQUIPMENT ROOMS | Storage of non combustible Materials | 5 | Storage | ||
| 7 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | Cellar | MECHANICAL EQUIPMENT ROOMS | Mechanical and/or electrical equipment room | 14 | Factory and Industrial | ||
| 8 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | RETAIL A | Business and Service | 69 | Business | ||
| 9 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | RETAIL C | Retail Sale | 31 | Mercantile | ||
| 10 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | RETAIL D | Retail Sale | 67 | Mercantile | ||
| 11 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | MAIL AND PACKAGE ROOMS | Apartment | 0 | Residential | ||
| 12 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | RECYCLING & STORAGE ROOM | Storage of non combustible Materials | 3 | Storage | ||
| 13 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | RETAIL B | Retail Sale | 28 | Mercantile | ||
| 14 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | ACCESSORY BUILDING STORAGE | Storage of non combustible Materials | 7 | Storage | ||
| 15 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | TRASH COMPACTOR ROOM | Storage of non combustible Materials | 3 | Storage | ||
| 16 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | LOBBY | Apartment | 0 | Residential | ||
| 17 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 1 | LOADING AREA | Storage of non combustible Materials | 11 | Storage | ||
| 18 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 2 | LAUNDRY ROOM | Apartment | 7 | Residential | ||
| 19 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 2 | AMENITY ROOMS (NO INDIVIDUAL ROOM TO EXCEED 20 PERSONS) | Apartment | 57 | Residential | ||
| 20 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 2 | MECHANICAL EQUIPMENT ROOMS | Mechanical and/or electrical equipment room | 1 | Factory and Industrial | ||
| 21 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 2 | (3) CLASS A APARTMENTS | Apartment | Residential | 3 | ||
| 22 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 2 | ACCESSORY LEASING OFFICE | Apartment | 8 | Residential | ||
| 23 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 3 | (19) CLASS A APARTMENTS | Apartment | Residential | 19 | ||
| 24 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 3 | BICYCLE STORAGE ROOM | Storage of non combustible Materials | 12 | Storage | ||
| 25 | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | acris | 10/27/2025 04:38 AM | 4 | (20) CLASS A APARTMENTS | Apartment | Residential | 20 |
This is the second large project TF Cornerstone has filed in the past three months. In Chelsea, TF Cornerstone submitted a new building construction project for a 278-unit, 210,781 square-foot residential (R-2) building at 273 West 22nd Street. That plan was filed with the New York City Department of Buildings on September 16, 2025 under job number M01268347. It calls for the construction of a 18-story building.
In addition, the developer signed a memorandum of master development agreement in August to ground lease land in Brooklyn, through insiders said it could take years to firm up development.
At the former Cohen Brothers Realty building, TF Cornerstone through the entity 135 E 57 LLC signed a 99-year ground lease valued at $159 million with the Wallace family through the entity 700 Lexington LLC for control of the office building (O4) at 135 East 57th Street in Midtown East, Manhattan.
The deal closed on August 4, 2025 and was recorded on August 12, 2025. The property has 397,354 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The sale price per built square foot is $400 per the PincusCo analysis. (The price per square foot analysis is the transaction price divided by square feet as reported in public records and assumes no air rights have been sold.)
The signatory for the Wallace family was William F. Wallace . The signatory for TF Cornerstone was Jeremy Shell.
The Wallace family has owned the site since the 1940s, when the married couple Stratford Corbett Wallace and Dolorita Fitzgerald Wallace began assembling the parcels. They ground leased the site in 1972 to Kenneth and Lucille Gladstone’s Madison Equities, which constructed the existing building. Madison Equities then sold the ground lease to Cohen Brothers Realty in 1997. Cohen Brothers, now led by Charles S. Cohen , lost the building after failing to pay ground rent. That lease was cancelled on June 26, 2024, according to a court order recorded in Acris.
The property
The office and retail building in Midtown East has 397,354 square feet of built space according to a PincusCo analysis of city data. The parcel has frontage of 215 feet and is 200 feet deep with a total lot size of 26,731 square feet. The lot is irregular. The zoning is C5-2 which allows for up to 10 times floor area ratio (FAR) for commercial and up to 10 times FAR for residential with inclusionary housing. The city-designated market value for the property in 2022 is $164.8 million.
Prior sales and revenue
This property was ground leased by William F. Wallace, as lessor, in a lease valued at $159 million, to tenant TF Cornerstone on August 4, 2025.
Violations and lawsuits
According to city public data, the property has received $5,675 in OATH penalties in the last year.
The property was involved in four lawsuits and zero bankruptcies over the past two years. The highest value suit was a $544.3 million money judgment concerning a loan filed on March 25, 2024, by Fortress Investment Group against Charles S. Cohen and Cohen Brothers Realty.
The neighborhood
In Midtown East, The majority, or 81 percent of the 62.6 million square feet of commercial built space are office buildings, with hotel buildings next occupying 7 percent of the space. In sales, Midtown East has the 2nd highest sale turnover among other neighborhoods in the city with $3.6 billion in sales volume in the last two years. For development, Midtown East is the 3rd most active neighborhood among other neighborhoods. It had 16.2 million square feet of commercial and multi-family construction under development in the last two years, which represents 26 percent of the neighborhood’s built space.
The block
On this tax block, PincusCo has identified the owners of 15 of the 20 commercial properties representing 1,297,568 square feet of the 1,332,045 square feet. The largest owner is Abs Partners Real Estate, followed by Achs Management and then Alex Adjmi. There are no other active large building construction projects on this tax block.
The owner
The PincusCo database currently indicates that TF Cornerstone owned at least 35 commercial properties with 11,143 residential units in New York City with 12,099,366 square feet and a city-determined market value of $3.3 billion. (Market value is typically about 50% of actual value.) Within the portfolio, the bulk, or 86 percent of the 12,099,366 square feet of built space are elevator properties, with office properties next occupying 7 percent of the space. The bulk, or 54 percent of the built space, is in Manhattan, with Queens next at 33 percent of the space.
The surrounding
Within a 400-foot radius of 137 East 57 Street, PincusCo identified three commercial real estate items of interests occurred over the past 24 months. Of those three items, one was for major renovation including a certificate of occupancy change. It was a permit application filed on June 18, 2025 for the $26.9 million renovation of 252,893-square-foot 56 building with zero residential units at 460 Park Avenue. One of those three items was a sale which Cerco Funding bought the 85,449-square-foot, 34-unit office building (O4) on 695 Lexington Avenue for $8.6 million from Silk & Halpern Realty Associates on March 6, 2025. One of those three items was a loan which Hotel Grand Central L.L.C. borrowed $40 million from Manufacturers And Traders Trust Company secured by the 64,614-square-foot, one-unit hotel (HS) on 687 Lexington Avenue and one other property on August 11, 2025.
Direct link to the property’s ACRIS page and link to DOB NOW portal.