BEVERLY HILLS : Bloomingdale’s Flagship in Sight

After more than a year of negotiations, Beverly Hills officials announced Tuesday that they have reached an agreement to bring Bloomingdale’s West Coast flagship store to city-owned land on Beverly Drive.

City Manager Mark Scott and a representative of Federated Department Stores, which owns Bloomingdale’s, signed the non-binding letter of intent during a private meeting. No terms of the agreement were released, although Beverly Hills Mayor Vicki Reynolds said the City Council will air details of the deal during a Feb. 21 meeting.

Besides the city-owned site spanning the 200 block of North Beverly and North Canon drives, the retailer has purchased six adjacent parcels from private parties.

Beverly Hills has been wooing the ritzy New York retailer for more than a year. When Bloomingdale’s announced plans last June to locate four stores in Southern California, Los Angeles was among the cities that tried to persuade it to build stores in the city. Last year, Bloomingdale’s presented Beverly Hills with plans and a model of the proposed 240,000-square-foot department store.

In March, 1994, upscale Barneys New York opened its first West Coast store on Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills. The 125,000-square-foot store is only blocks from the proposed Bloomingdale’s location.