Potential tenants make Liberty Center the “Easton of Cincinnati”

Rendering of the future Liberty Center, a mega retail, office and residential development to be built in Butler County. Plans are for the $300 million project to open in 2015.

Credit: CONTRIBUTED

Credit: CONTRIBUTED

Rendering of the future Liberty Center, a mega retail, office and residential development to be built in Butler County. Plans are for the $300 million project to open in 2015.

As the developer of the mega mixed development slated for Liberty Twp. works to sign leases with retailers and entertainment venues, they’re working from a roster of tenants new to the Cincinnati area, but familiar to central Ohio — a lineup similar to Easton Town Center.

Columbus-based developer Steiner + Associates is building a 1.4 million-square-foot retail, office, cinema, dining, hotel and residential complex in Butler County at the intersection of Ohio 129, Interstate 75 and Liberty Way. Site work has begun to prepare for construction, with infrastructure and building construction expected to start by the end of February.

Liberty Center, as the development is named, would be modeled after other Steiner developments such as Easton in Columbus and The Greene in Beavercreek.

At a Butler County commissioners meeting in April 2013, Anne Mastin, Steiner executive vice president of retail real estate, said "we will absolutely be targeting the entire tenant list we have today at Easton."

Based on that statement, potential tenants for Liberty Center would include an Apple store, Banana Republic, American Eagle Outfitters, a Lego store and Macy’s, among others. Dining establishments at Easton that could sign to open at Liberty Center include Brio Tuscan Grille, bd’s Mongolian Grille and Cafe Instanbul.

The biggest difference between Easton and The Greene, and the future Liberty Center, is size, Yaromir Steiner, founder and chief executive officer of Steiner + Associates, previously told Journal-News. Both Easton and The Greene were built in phases, starting at 600,000 to 800,000 square feet.

Steiner said Liberty Center’s footprint starts bigger, at initially more than 1 million-square-feet in the first phase at a total estimated cost of more than $300 million.

Site plans call for: more than 200 luxury apartments; a 150-room hotel, either a Hilton, Marriott or Hyatt brand; 75,000-square-feet of office space; a two-level Dillard’s anchor store; a second, junior anchor store; dinner-and-movie theater CineBistro; a non-denominational chapel; and “The Foundry,” an enclosed, two-story mall with covered “streets.”

Read the Journal-News Wednesday for the latest updates on the progress at Liberty Center.