Seattle Retail & Hospitality Summit

Alesha has devoted her career to serving the Shopping Center Industry. Currently, as Director of Retail, she is responsible for the Retail Management Team that oversees all retail and restaurant tenant relations at The Bellevue Collection. Prior to this position she was a Managing Vice President of Leasing for Brookfield Properties where Alesha was involved with many national brands and helped advance the re-envisioning of shopping centers. Through previous experience with Macerich, the direction of her career was established as she progressed to Assistant Vice President. Alesha is very involved with the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) and currently serves as the Pacific Northwest Marketplace Membership Chair. She also works with the planning committees for local events and the Western Conference, gives support in both the local and national ICSC public policy programs, sits on the ICSC Economic Committee and has held many other board positions since joining ICSC in 1999. She is active for many other industry associations including sitting on the board for the Washington Business Properties Association and is the incoming Chair for Washington Retail. These positions have given her a broad insight into the ever-changing industry and allow her to help drive the direction of the industry. In her personal time, Alesha volunteers with many local organizations including being the immediate Past-President of PNB STARS, a group devoted to raising money for the Pacific Northwest Ballet (PNB). Continuing in her devotion to the Arts, she is Treasurer for the Performing Arts Center Eastside (PACE). Additionally, Alesha is an active member of Seattle Yacht Club (SYC) and holds the position of the 2024 Admiralette as well as the Junior Advisory Co-Chair. She has chaired multiple opening night PNB Galas and many other PNB events, raised money on capital campaign and community events for PACE and helped support SYC on many different events.

Jon Buerge is the President and Partner at Urban Villages, Inc. In this capacity, Jon is responsible for operations, real estate development, and strategic positioning for all real estate assets. He also manages the research and analysis of new company acquisitions and corporate growth strategies. Jon currently serves as the Chair of the Denver Business Improvement District and is on the Board of Directors for the LoDo District. He is also a member of Denver’s Public Realm Committee and 16th Street Mall Redevelopment Steering Committee.

With 18 years of experience in both domestic and international retail-driven projects, Sarah has been dedicated to transforming retail spaces into thriving centers of activity and community engagement. She has worked on projects ranging from mixed-use master plans to regional retail centers to repositioning of retail anchor stores, both domestically and internationally from Canada to the Middle East. This global experience has given her insights into retail trends taking shape around the world and the ways that we can harness them more locally. Much of her work in the vicinity of Seattle has revolved around revitalizing and renovating existing retail assets, exemplified by projects like 300 Pine and The Outlet Collection. Across all projects, Sarah maintains a commitment to crafting intentional and vibrant public spaces to optimize the land value for the clients while creating desirable destinations for the customers. Sarah firmly believes that retail, entertainment, and food & beverage-driven ventures serve as the linchpin connecting various end-user groups and fostering stronger communities. Sarah’s focus on the retail sector has led to her involvement with the ICSC Centerbuild Programming committee. For the past 8 years, Sarah has been an integral part of shaping the content for the annual Centerbuild Conference—an event focused on Retail and Mixed-Use development, design, and construction. This conference serves as a nexus for thought leaders, uniting owners, tenants, design teams, and contractors from across North America – Identifying the current state of the industry and charting the course for its evolution to meet the evolving needs of the communities we serve. On a local level, Sarah proudly serves as Vice President - Student Recruitment within the ACE Mentor program in Seattle. This organization plays a pivotal role in introducing high school students to the world of Architecture, Construction, and Engineering. Having initially volunteered as a mentor for 5 years, she then joined the Executive Board in 2017. Over the course of 22 years, this chapter has generously awarded more than $1,200,000 in scholarships, providing invaluable support for students pursuing careers in Building Design and Construction. In recognition of her commitment to excellence and innovation within the realm of retail and mixed-use development, Sarah was honored to be named to both the BD+C 40 under 40 and the ICSC Centerbuild 20 under 40 in 2014.

As an award-winning retail and hospitality Principal Designer at MG2, Mitch Pride has always gravitated toward the creative aspects of architecture, resourcefully bringing together space, form, and volume to turn complex concepts into alluring yet functional realities. He is an expert at owning and facilitating the creative process, partnering with clients to realize their vision while never losing sight of the big picture. With a remarkable ability to immediately bring ideas to life through sketch, Mitch synthesizes aspirations into tangible outcomes, resulting in truly novel retail solutions that set brands apart in the marketplace. Inspired by the flow of exteriors into equally compelling interiors, Mitch is a strategic romantic who specializes in helping clients see beyond their perceived limitations, translating aspirations into design solutions.

Maria has over 30 years of diverse commercial real estate experience in disciplines ranging from development, sales and leasing, to asset management and finance. Maria and the Real Retail team exclusively represent over three-quarters of a million square feet of urban mixed-use centers and new community and lifestyle centers in the greater Seattle area including past and present notable projects such as Amazon’s World Headquarters, Rainier Square, Kirkland Urban, Ballard Blocks I & II, Everett Riverfront, The Meridian, 7th & Pine and TwoPine. Maria’s past experience also includes the successful lease-up of ground up developments including of Green Lake Village, Grand Ridge Plaza in Issaquah, Kent Station in Kent, and Bella Bottega in Redmond where she played a leadership role in pre-development, pre-marketing and transaction phase of the development cycle on each project. Maria’s present and past experience is also comprised of facilitating several specialty retailers and restaurants in their expansion strategies in the Pacific Northwest including: Equinox, Soul Cycle, Shake Shack, Sephora, Athleta, Old Navy, William Sonoma, West Elm, Trader Joe’s and The Container Store. Using the knowledge and expertise she acquired while working on a wide range of projects of all sizes throughout the region, Maria provides her clients with extensive information and awareness about the unique retail environment in the Pacific Northwest. Maria approaches each assignment as a partnership to ensure long-term project and tenant success. While working at Wright Runstad & Company Maria provided retail leasing, operations and property management services for their Class A office portfolio. This experience gives Maria valuable insight and lends a holistic approach to the challenges of leasing. While at Teranomics Retail Services, Maria was a strong contributor to the Seattle Office’s overall success and helped instigate the Teranomics merger with Federal Realty. Maria later acquired the rights to the Seattle Office of Teranomics which she parlayed into a partnership with Blatteis Realty for several years. In 2004 Maria formed Real Retail and has since maintained a dominant role in the retail landscape in the Greater Seattle Region. Prior positions include a Sales & Marketing Associate with Colliers - The Seeley Company in Los Angeles. While earning a degree in Business Administration, with a dual emphasis in Finance & Marketing at the University of Southern California, Maria also held a variety of internship positions including an advertising and marketing internship at New World Pictures in Los Angeles, an industrial brokerage internship at Grubb & Ellis Brokerage firm in Torrance, and also worked as a retail sales associate at Ann Taylor in Century City where she was a top producer selling to entertainment industry wardrobers. Maria is a past member of the Board of Directors for Plymouth Housing Group, where she served as Co-Chair for three years for Seattle Dances, a high-profile event where local celebrities and professional dancers perform in support of Plymouth Housing Group. She is on the President’s Round Table of the Downtown Seattle Association (DSA) and a member of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC). Maria grew up in Seattle where she attended Forest Ridge Girls School and Seattle Preparatory School.

Heidi is an architect and interior designer with 23 years of experience with retail and hospitality projects. In addition to ground-up designs, Heidi brings a wealth of knowledge in the design and adaptive reuse of vacant retail and light industrial spaces into restaurants, breweries, production facilities, and commercial kitchens. Heidi is currently partnering with both local and global clients on fine dining, quick-service restaurants, coffee shops, winery tasting rooms, and commercial kitchen designs. Heidi’s knowledge of brand-driven design allows her to determine a client’s story and translate that through look, feel, and function in real space. She is a hands-on project manager who works closely with her team throughout the entire design process and into construction to create solutions that ensure a client’s brand resonates and creates customer loyalty.

Tom Wolf is 42+ year veteran of Hyatt. He began his career as a reservations clerk, and has since worked at 14 different Hyatt properties in Chicago, Washington, D.C., Aruba and southern California before moving to Seattle in 2012. Mr. Wolf has been General Manager at the Grand Hyatt, Hyatt Olive 8, and the Hyatt Regency Bellevue. In April 2018, he moved back downtown to open the 1260 room Hyatt Regency Seattle and most recently complexed the three Hyatt convention core hotels mid-2020. His properties consistently achieve company-high NPS and colleague engagement scores. Raised in Chicago, Illinois, Mr. Wolf attended Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan with a major in hotel/restaurant management and DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois with a major in business management.

As EVP, Matt focuses on business development, including planning and execution of pre-opening technical services, new property construction design and development consulting. Matt’s background has been focused on opening and managing full service, independent, unique hotels and restaurants. A Seattle native, Matt is a University of Washington graduate with a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from the Foster School of Business. Matt is a past board member of the Seattle Hotel Association and teaches the certificate of commercial real estate at the University of Washington. Matt is a husband, father of two, a Husky alum, an avid cyclist (including a ride from Prague to Budapest), golfer, outdoor enthusiast, recreational surfer, and enjoys travel of all kinds. The best way to describe Matt is: eternal optimist, family guy, and enthusiastic.

“My People used to say, when a stranger appears at your door, feed him for three days before asking who he is, where he's come from, where he's headed. That way, he'll have strength enough to answer. Or, by then you'll be such good friends, you don't care.” Bashar Wali is a founder, a father, and a hotel fanatic. He’s a pragmatist—hungry to experience life not as it is packaged and sold, but as it is. His vested interest in hospitality, culture, and design, is cut with curiosity of what’s possible, beyond the status quo. Bashar is always looking for that spark—that perfect symmetry of an idea and its physical manifestation—to make human experiences as we know them, better. He’s the consummate Host of the Soirée—ever in pursuit of a shared humanity among friends, colleagues, and total strangers. This is perhaps his greatest gift: bringing together a group that’s more inspiring than the sum of its parts. As founder and CEO of This Assembly and Practice Hospitality, Bashar draws upon expertise honed over a 30-year career in hospitality. An expert in the lifestyle space, Bashar is known for pushing limits in his philosopher-meets-hotelier kind of way. Whether helming the TEDx stage, hosting a Global YPO event, or collaborating on Clubhouse, Bashar’s message is unwavering: service is what you deliver, hospitality is how you make people feel. Bashar has done every job in a hotel—from frying an egg to negotiating a deal—working for Starwood Hotels before leading acquisitions and development globally at Grand Heritage Hotels. Prior to launching This Assembly and Practice Hospitality, Bashar served as President/CEO of Provenance Hotels, where he remains a partner, for 15 years, growing the company from five to 15 hotels, 1,500 team members, and expanding the collection from the Pacific Northwest to an award-winning national brand, with annual revenue in excess of $150 million. When Bashar isn’t traveling to 50+ countries and 45+ states, he’s home in Portland, Oregon with his wife and kids, dreaming up the hotels of tomorrow.

Marissa Alkhazov is the Northwest Chair of Buchalter’s Product Liability Practice Group. Her clients include small businesses, Fortune 500 companies, emerging businesses, manufacturers, distributors, retail, hospitality and food and beverage corporations. Marissa’s client base of brands boasts a global and U.S. based presence. In the retail and hospitality space, Marissa works with her clients to assist in addressing the full spectrum of legal issues they face, including general counseling, labor and employment, leasing and landlord/tenant issues, premises liability, risk assessment, real estate and development, construction related claims and more. Marissa has experience in all phases of these types of matters, including at the trial and appellate level. Marissa understands there is nothing ordinary about the challenges business leaders face in this space. The multi-faceted nature of retail and hospitality work requires counsel that are capable of synthesizing numerous complex moving parts, while also minimizing risk and disruptions by ensuring assets are operated efficiently and all liabilities are managed effectively. Marissa immerses herself in her clients’ business environment to clarify goals, and is a highly effective negotiator and trial attorney, where necessary. Marissa anticipates regulatory hurdles and seeks practical solutions to clients’ compliance obligations across the lifecycle of a project or major initiative.