Trader Joe’s has signed a new lease at NoHo West, the 25-acre project to redevelop a defunct shopping center in North Hollywood.

The grocery store will take up 15,900 square feet of space inside the project, a mixed-use complex of multiple buildings that Merlone Geier and GPI Companies are carving out of the former Laurel Plaza Shopping Center. The shopping center was once anchored by a 475,000 square-foot Macy’s.

The lease checks off an important box on the developers’ punch list. The city approved the project in 2016 with the expectation that NoHo West would replace Laurel Plaza’s “underutilized” retail space with a “higher concentration and variety of commercial uses,” including a grocery store, according to a city document.

The store will also serve the 642 residential units that are planned for the complex.

This will be the first Trader Joe’s in North Hollywood. The grocery chain operates locations throughout the San Fernando Valley in nearby Burbank, Sherman Oaks, Studio City, and Toluca Lake.

Analysts say construction of new grocery stores has not kept up with L.A.’s residential boom. A survey put out by the Downtown Business Improvement District found that 60 percent of DTLA residents wanted a market near them.

Representatives of Merlone Geier did not respond immediately to requests for comment.