The International Society for Krishna Consciousness, also called the Hare Krishna movement, plans to unload its headquarters in the United States, located in the Brooklyn city center, for more than $60 million, or upwards of $300 for every buildable square foot, reports The Real Deal.
Located at 295-309 Schermerhorn Street, the ISKCON property includes a four-story building spread over an area of 34,000 square feet, in addition to 187,000 square feet of buildable area and 155 feet of frontage on Schermerhorn Street. Currently, the building houses a temple and a vegetarian restaurant called "Govinda."
Property records show that the building is owned by Sri Sri Radha Govinda Mandir, who has owned the main temple of ISKCON in the United States since 1983.
Currently, the Hare Krishna movement is reportedly hunting for a new site in Queens to set up its new headquarters, as the majority of its religious organization's members live in that borough, sources said.
The report adds that the site is being marketed by David Schechtman, executive managing director of Eastern Consolidated, and the firm's associate director Andrew Sassoon. The duo is also helping ISKCON to look for a new site to set up its new headquarters.
The Hare Krishna movement began in the United States soon after A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, who founded the International Society for Krishna Consciousness in Mayapur, India, moved to New York in 1965 with the aim of spreading his beliefs to the West.
DNAInfo quotes 33-year-old Hare Krishna monk Bram de Vreede, who was rechristened as Vasudeva Das after he joined the movement in 1998, as saying that in 1966, Prabhupada leased the 22nd Avenue storefront to set up the group's first temple.
As the movement spread quickly, the space became too small for the organization to carry out its socio-religious activities. Hence, ISKCON moved its base to another location in 1968. However, the directors of the Hare Krishna temple in Brooklyn leased the place again and reopened the temple in 1991. Currently, this place is getting an overhaul to look just like it did back then.
Vasudeva Das told DNAInfo that once the planned renovations are complete, the place will operate like a "living museum" with public access. "It is a space that will evoke [a] meditation of the person [Prabhupada] - his spirit, his compassion, his boldness in reaching out to people," he told the website.
