Developer Buys 'Blue Castle' in Southeast

"It's a great building, and we've thoroughly enjoyed being here because it has good transportation, with good bus lines and Metro nearby, and it's in an up-and-coming neighborhood," Gilmore said. "It's a neighborhood you'd love to stay in, but you have to face reality about the price of real estate."

Watergate's Scandalous Cachet

Belles Rives was the classic French name that D.C. developer Monument Realty LLC was planning to give to the Watergate Hotel, which it is closing and converting into about 100 luxury co-op units. But the company has decided instead to stick with the Watergate, a name that comes with built-in brand identification.

"It's better marketing," said Michael Darby, a principal at Monument. "If you just say, 'the Watergate,' people identify with it."

The Watergate complex consists of the hotel, three residential co-op buildings and two office buildings -- one of them the site of the 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters that eventually led to President Richard M. Nixon's resignation. The complex was built in the 1960s and designed by Italian architect Luigi Moretti. It is next to the John F. Kennedy Center and overlooks the Potomac River.

Monument is redeveloping the hotel despite continuing opposition from some co-op owners in the Watergate complex. The developer would like to use some space in the hotel for additional parking for its new co-op residences. But that space belongs to the co-op owners, and some of them do not want to sell. They have tried to block Monument's redevelopment plans by filing a lawsuit and demanding recounts of votes from co-op owner meetings. A court hearing in the dispute is scheduled for February.

Monument said its $50 million renovation of the hotel into co-ops is expected to start in spring and be completed in early 2008.

Closings

Grosvenor Group Holdings Ltd., a London real estate investment company with offices in the District, sold two office buildings totaling 123,000 square feet at the research and technology park next to the University of Maryland Baltimore County to Baltimore-based Merritt Properties LLC.

Corporate Office Properties Trust of Columbia acquired 7 office buildings in Hunt Valley, Md., and 14 office buildings in Woodlawn, Md. The company said the 21 Baltimore County properties were valued at $124.5 million.

Dana Hedgpeth writes about commercial real estate and economic development. Her e-mail is hedgpethd@washpost.com.