Starwood Capital buys Westfield malls

Starwood Capital Group acquired a 90 percent interest in seven Westfield Group malls totaling 6.6 million square feet, none of them in Connecticut where Starwood Capital has its main office in Greenwich.

The portfolio will be overseen by a new entity named Starwood Retail Partners, based in Chicago and led by Scott Wolstein, who previously founded the shopping center owner DDR.

“Shopping centers in the United States are undergoing a transformation as junior anchors and value retailers are rethinking store size and distribution needs, to the benefit of regional malls, including the ones we recently acquired from Westfield,” Wolstein said, in a written statement. “We expect to build on this platform in the years to come.”

The malls are located in Chicago, Cleveland, Miami, San Francisco, Fairfield, Calif., and Lincoln, Neb. In Connecticut, Westfield Group has malls in Trumbull, Milford and Meriden.