After spending the past two decades scouring Manhattan for the right location and the right deal, Nordstrom, the upscale department store, has finally found a home.

The chain, based in Seattle, signed a binding agreement with Extell Development this week to open New York City’s first new full-scale department store in recent memory, a 7-story, 300,000-square-foot behemoth in the base of a planned skyscraper on the north side of 57th Street, east of Broadway, according to real estate executives who have been briefed on the deal.

Nordstrom made it to New Jersey years ago, but it found Manhattan daunting and expensive. The company is known for its customer service, the breadth of its shoe department and its longstanding relationships with designers like Dolce & Gabbana, Hugo Boss, Marc Jacobs and See by Chloé.

“It’s a very big deal,” M. Ronald Ruskin, managing director of Lansco, a retail broker, and a former chairman of Gimbels, said when a reporter told him of the deal. “It’s probably the most interesting thing to happen in retail in a long time.”