Chipotle Mexican Grill, the fast-food chain best known for its burritos and bowls, will “temporarily” relocate its headquarters to Fashion Island, a destination shopping center overlooking posh Newport Harbor, a company spokeswoman said.

The new headquarters will occupy a “two-story space in Fashion Island until we determine a more permanent location,” Laurie Schalow, Chipotle’s chief communications officer, said in an email Monday, July 16.

A listing for the new space said the lease expires at the end of September 2020.

Chipotle announced in May it’s moving to Newport Beach from its home base in Denver. The announcement came soon after the chain hired Orange County resident and former Taco Bell chief Brian Niccol as its new chief executive.

But Schalow declined to confirm a story first reported in the Orange County Business Journal that the company is subleasing the 14th floor and part of the 13th floor at 610 Newport Center Drive.

The 18-story, 272-foot tall high-rise, just north of the shopping mall and across from the Big Canyon Country Club, is Orange County’s ninth-tallest high rise.

The business journal reported Chipotle will sublease the 22,667-square-foot space from CareerBuilder, a Chicago-based job-search and talent-locator firm.

The 14th floor has 15,052 square feet, including 80 workstations, three conference rooms, seven private offices, a break room and a coffee bar, according to a listing from JLL, the brokerage representing CareerBuilder. The 13th floor has 7,615 square feet, including 45 workstations, a conference room, three private offices and a design lounge.

Located less than a mile from Newport Harbor, Fashion Island is home to some of Orange County’s leading businesses, including the Irvine Co., bond-trading firm Pimco, Pacific Life Insurance and Newport Beach City Hall. Law firm O’Melveny & Myers occupies the top three floors of 610 Newport Center Dr.

The move to Newport Beach will start Oct. 5, the company said in a notice filed with the Colorado labor department last month, and should be complete by March. Chipotle is also shutting down its corporate office in New York City, relocating operations from Denver and New York either to Newport Beach or to an existing office in Columbus, Ohio, the company said.

Newport Beach will serve as headquarters for the company’s operations, business development, marketing, communications, finance, supply chain, food safety, technology, HR and other corporate functions, the company said in May. The support functions will be located in Columbus.

A number of workers at the current Denver headquarters will have the option to move to Southern California, while others “will be laid off,” the company said. The largest job losses will come in the human resources and information technology departments.

Niccol told investors in a June 27 conference call Chipotle plans a big recruitment drive after its move to Newport Beach, the business journal reported.

“The consolidation of offices and the move to California will help us drive sustainable growth while continuing to position us well in the competition for top talent,” Niccol, who became Chipotle’s CEO in February, said in May.

Chipotle currently employs 399 people at its Denver headquarters, the company said in its Colorado labor department filing.

If Chipotle’s Newport Beach headquarters staffing is that large, the company would become Newport Beach’s 15th biggest employer, city business records show.

The company has been restructuring and closing underperforming restaurants since going through a series of health scares across the country over the past three years.

An outbreak of E. coli in late 2015 caused shares to tank, and sales shrank. Last summer, more than 135 people reported getting sick after eating at Chipotle in Virginia — two of them tested positive for norovirus. Reports of sickened employees and customers at a Los Angeles Chipotle last December further battered stock prices.

Niccol, who owns a home in Newport Beach, previously served as CEO of Irvine-based Taco Bell. Chipotle’s stock price rebounded after it announced Niccol’s hiring.

Under former CEO Steve Ells, Chipotle had signed a 15-year deal to occupy five floors inside Denver’s new 1144 Fifteenth tower. The lease was canceled after Niccol came on board, however, and the move switched to the West Coast.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last month, Chipotle executives estimated it would cost $70 million to $80 million to consolidate on the West Coast. Between $40 million and $45 million of that is expected to be spent on employee relocation and related costs, and another $20 million to $25 million will go to “lease exit costs.”

Register staff writers Jonathan Lansner and Marilyn Kalfus contributed to this report.