Gensler co‑chair joins Douglas Emmett

Douglas Emmett added Gensler global co-chair Andy Cohen to its board, bringing one of commercial real estate’s best-known architects into the room. (businesswire.com) The Santa Monica real estate investment trust said Cohen’s election took effect April 8, 2026. The company disclosed the move in a Form 8-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 10. (sec.gov) Cohen spent 43 years at Gensler and served as co-chief executive from 2005 to 2024 before moving into the global co-chair role. Douglas Emmett said Gensler had 60 offices and 6,500 professionals when it announced the appointment. (businesswire.com) Douglas Emmett owns and operates about 18 million square feet of Class A office space and more than 5,442 apartment units in Los Angeles and Honolulu. That makes board seats especially consequential as office landlords weigh leasing, redevelopment and capital decisions property by property. (ir.douglasemmett.com) The company’s office portfolio was 78.0 percent occupied and 80.4 percent leased at the end of 2025, while its multifamily portfolio was 98.0 percent occupied and 99.5 percent leased. In fourth-quarter results, management said it signed 896 office leases covering 3.4 million square feet in 2025 and posted about 100,000 square feet of positive net office absorption in the fourth quarter. (publicnow.com, finance.yahoo.com) Cohen’s background is not in finance or law. He is a registered architect in 41 states and three Canadian provinces, and he sits on advisory groups tied to the Urban Land Institute, the University of California, Berkeley, the University of California, Los Angeles, and the University of Southern California. (businesswire.com, gensler.com) The board change also lines up with a retirement. Director Leslie E. Bider told the company on April 6 that he would not stand for re-election, and Douglas Emmett said his term will end at the annual meeting scheduled for May 28, 2026. (sec.gov) Douglas Emmett said Bider’s departure was not the result of any disagreement with management or the board. Cohen’s election temporarily expands the board to nine directors from eight, and the filing says his term also runs through the annual meeting. (sec.gov) For Douglas Emmett, the immediate change is simple: a board seat vacated by a retiring director is being filled by an architect whose career has tracked the office market’s rise, redesign and reset. (sec.gov, gensler.com)