Baltimore’s landmark One Charles Center office tower has landed a large new anchor tenant.
The 23-story building at 100 N. Charles St. will become the new headquarters of the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE).
Maryland’s Board of Public Works this fall approved a 15-year lease that calls for the agency to occupy 160,238 square feet in One Charles Center starting on Jan. 1, 2028. It will be on eight floors – more than one third of the building. The three-member board approved the lease on Sept. 16.
It’s a strong vote of confidence in the 64-year-old glass and aluminum tower — one of two buildings in Baltimore that were designed by the famous architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, along with Highfield House, which opened in 1964 at 4000 N. Charles St.
It’s also a win for the relatively new owner of the building, 100 N. Charles Owner LLC of Great Falls, Va., headed by Patrick Grace and Prabhakar Thangarajah. They bought the tower at auction in April of 2024 for $4 million and decided to keep it as offices rather than convert it to apartments as some suggested.
One Charles Center was selected over two other finalists that were under consideration to house the state agency, the Candler Building at 700 E. Pratt St. and MCB Real Estate’s 1 E. Pratt St.
Charles Center landmark
Before the sale in 2024, One Charles Center was part of the portfolio of commercial buildings owned by the late Peter G. Angelos, the former Orioles owner and attorney who moved his law office there in 1996 and died in 2024 at age 94.
It’s also notable as the first office building completed in the 33-acre Charles Center renewal area, created in the 1960s to revitalize downtown Baltimore, and the first major example of International Style architecture in downtown Baltimore. One Charles Center was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000, one of the first Modern buildings in Baltimore to be recognized that way.
The 341,478-square-foot building opened in 1962 after its developer, Metropolitan Structures of Chicago, was selected in a competition held by the city. As part of its proposal, Metropolitan said it would work with Mies van der Rohe, whose recently-completed Seagram Building in New York City set the standard for Modernist, glass-skinned office buildings in American cities. Metropolitan wanted to make a statement that it was bringing world-class contemporary architecture to downtown Baltimore. Its proposal was selected over a plan from the Blaustein family, working with the noted architect Marcel Breuer.
Construction was completed in 13 months at a cost of $10,350,000 – more than the Blaustein family had offered to spend. The building’s base consists of a stone-faced podium topped by a paved plaza, with an office tower above and parking below ground. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000.
Other architects who designed Modern buildings for Charles Center after Mies van der Rohe include John Johansen, designer of the Morris A. Mechanic Theatre; Conklin & Rossant, architect of the Two Charles Center apartment towers; RTKL Associates, designer of the Charles Center South office tower at 36 S. Charles St., and Peterson & Brickbauer, architect of the Sun Life Building at 20 S. Charles St. and the former Mercantile Safe Deposit & Trust Co. headquarters on Hopkins Plaza, now a residential building called the 2Hopkins Apartments.
Fluctuating occupancy rates
One Charles Center has had several prominent corporate tenants over the years, and enjoyed occupancy rates above 90 percent for its first several decades. By mid-2024, however, its occupancy rate had plummeted to about 33 percent.
The biggest drop in occupancy came in the 1990s when a previous anchor tenant, CSX Corp., moved its headquarters to Jacksonville, Fla. and vacated more than 100,000 square feet.
The building went up for auction in 1993 and was acquired by its mortgage holder, the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company or MetLife, for $11.5 million. An Angelos entity, PGA One Charles Center, bought it in 1996 for $6 million, and he moved his law office there. Another law firm in the building for many years was Wright, Constable & Skeen, LLP, now based in Towson. Other prestigious former tenants include T. Rowe Price and the Center Club of Baltimore — its first location downtown.
As of July 1, the building has an assessed value of $3,949,100, according to state land records. It occupies 36,808 square feet of land, about three-quarters of an acre.
Leaving the Nancy S. Grasmick building
The MSDE is moving from the 187,000-square-foot Nancy S. Grasmick State Education Building at 200 W. Baltimore Street, across from the CFG Bank Arena.
Dating from 1911, the state-owned building is in need of extensive upgrades and its future is uncertain. Its main entrance was closed for repairs in July of 2025 after chunks of masonry fell from its façade onto the sidewalk below, but the building remained open to employees and visitors who could enter from Liberty Street. Six months earlier, Gov. Wes Moore had placed the MSDE headquarters on a list of state offices to be downsized, triggering the agency’s search for a new location.
The Baltimore Street building was constructed as the home of the Baltimore Bargain House, a mail order wholesale business, and later converted to an office center called the Civic Plaza Building. Former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. renamed it in 2005 to honor the longtime state schools superintendent and civic leader. As of July 1, its assessed value is $15,422,600 and it is tax exempt, according to state records.
The move to One Charles Center is “in accordance with the modernization effort to right-size government and achieve savings,” Maryland’s Department of General Services wrote to the Board of Public Works in September. “This new location offers a safe and efficient workplace for the staff to operate.”
$24.50 per square foot
According to information presented to the Board of Public Works on Sept. 16, the base lease will start on Jan. 1, 2028 and run through Dec. 31, 2042. There is an option to negotiate a five-year extension that would take the lease to Dec. 31, 2047.
The first-year rent rate is $24.50 per square feet, or $3,928,036 in all. Rent will escalate three percent a year after that. The estimated full-term rate is $73,058,263.04 –more than 18 times what the current owners paid for the building.
The lease also includes provisions for 250 parking spaces in an underground garage on site. The monthly parking fee in the first year is $42,725, which includes five spaces at $300 per space per month; 18 spaces at $250 per space per month; 27 spaces at $175 per space per month, and 200 spaces at $160 per space per month.
The annual parking fee for the first year is $512,700. The rate will escalate 10 percent in years 6 and 11. The estimated full-term parking fee is $8,485,185.
When state officials were evaluating proposals, One Charles Center received the highest technical ranking, with 141 points, compared to 119 for the Candler Building and 116 for 1 E. Pratt. It also had the highest financial ranking, with 155 points, compared to 150.8 for the Candler Building and 134.3 for 1 E. Pratt.
The final net effective average annual rent at One Charles Center was calculated to be $5,542,079, compared to $5,770,779 for the Candler Building and $6,502,778 for 1 E. Pratt. When technical points and financial points were added, One Charles Center came in first, with 296 points compared to 269.8 for the Candler Building and 250.3 for 1 E. Pratt.
Current tenants
Current tenants of One Charles Center include Peter Angelos Law, still on the 21st floor; the Baltimore office of Quinn Evans, a national architecture practice; BCT Design Group; the Baltimore Regional Housing Partnership and Edible Arrangements.
At the building’s base is The Center for Architecture and Design, which houses the offices of several design-related organizations. The roster includes: the Baltimore chapter of the American Institute of Architects; the Baltimore Architecture Foundation; the Maryland chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects; the Baltimore chapter of the National Organization of Minority Architects; the Baltimore chapter of the Urban Land Institute; the Maryland chapter of the American Planning Association; the Charles Street Development Corp. and Baltimore Heritage, known for its ‘Five Minutes of Baltimore History’ video series and its efforts to save endangered buildings. The Center also has gallery and meeting areas and retail space for books about architecture and design.
