Photo courtesy of Coldwell Banker

Famous watch company Timex Group has inked a lease for space in a Shelton office park to serve as its new headquarters.

The company is taking 50,216 square feet at 6 Armstrong Park, according to Coldwell Banker Commercial Realty. The brokerage’s Senior Vice President Chris O’Hara represented Timex Group in the lease negotiations.

The privately held firm produces watches under a number of well-known brands, including Timex, Nautica, Salvatore Ferragamo, Versace and more and has around 3,000 employees worldwide. It sold its former Middlebury headquarters last year.

The Armstrong Park building where Timex is moving is owned by Windsor Management, a New York City-based real estate investment company with a portfolio largely concentrated in Manhattan office buildings.

It’s one of a cluster of mid-1980s office buildings around a small pond, sandwiched between Shelton’s Bridgeport Avenue commercial strip and CT-8 about halfway between exits 7 and 9.

Cushman & Wakefield’s Thomas O’Leary represented Windsor.

The lease comes as the local office markets continue to struggle under high vacancies and increasing negative absorption.

According to research from Cushman & Wakefield, the 3.71 million-square-foot Shelton/Stratford office market ended the fourth quarter of 2024 with a 24.7 percent overall availability rate and 53,910 for the quarter. Meanwhile, the 1.7 million-square-foot western New Haven County market faced a 32.7 percent direct vacancy rate and 140,089 square feet of negative absorption for the quarter.

Average asking rent in Western New Haven County was $20.46 per square foot and $20.40 per square foot in the Shelton/Stratford market, the brokerage said.