By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
The furniture store owner who bought the former Flamingo Chuckwagon restaurant property on Kapi‘olani Boulevard is buying the neighboring site of the Kodak Building complex to expand a planned $25 million interior design center.
Thomas Sorensen, owner of Inspiration Furniture in Pearlridge, plans to demolish the seven buildings on 3.4 acres of land at Kamake‘e Street and Kapi‘olani next month.
He would use less than a third of the property for parking, warehouse and loading dock space. The remainder would be resold, according to Colliers Monroe Friedlander, which brokered the deal.
A purchase price was not disclosed. Based on comparable sales of nearby property, the price is estimated around $13 million.
Owned by Japanese firm Fukuoka Jisho, the Kodak site used to be the headquarters of Eastman Kodak Co. in Hawai‘i and in the mid-1990s was planned for a luxury condominium. But a downturn in the high-end residential market scuttled redevelopment plans.
Sorensen bought the Flamingo site in late 1999 for $4.9 million. The 100,000-square-foot Honolulu Design Center is scheduled to break ground in October and open in early 2003.
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