Watchtower Buys Former Kyndryl Data Center Near Warwick Headquarters

The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., the New York corporation used by Jehovah's Witnesses, has bought a former data center and office building across the lake from the group's world headquarters in Warwick, New York.^[1][2] The sale closed on June 26, 2026, and the organization announced it on July 3.^[1][2][3] Neither Jehovah's Witnesses nor the business press disclosed a purchase price.^[1][2]

The property, a 432,989-square-foot building on roughly 68 acres in the Sterling Forest area of Orange County, was most recently operated as a corporate data center.^[1][2] Jehovah's Witnesses have named it "Blue Lake" and say it will support the organization's global operations.^[1] The business press describes the deal as the latest in a decade of expansion by the group across New York's Hudson Valley.^[2]

What was bought, and from whom

The building sits on Long Meadow Road in the Warwick and Tuxedo Park area, and Jehovah's Witnesses describe it as located "across the lake from world headquarters in Warwick."^[1][2] jw.org lists the parcel at 28 hectares (69 acres); the Rockland County Business Journal reports 68 acres.^[1][2] The structure measures 40,226 square meters — 432,989 square feet — combining office space with a data center.^[1]

The seller nuance is worth noting. Business coverage identifies the seller as Kyndryl, Inc., the IT-infrastructure services company that spun off from IBM in 2021.^[2] The Kyndryl operating name for the site was the Sterling Forest Business Resiliency Services Center.^[1][2] The organization's own statement refers to the prior owner more loosely as "IBM Corporation" — a description that matches the site's earlier lineage rather than the specific corporate entity that completed the 2026 sale.^[1][2]

The Rockland County Business Journal, the single source for the facility's electrical profile, reports a total power capacity of 8.75 megawatts, with 5.25 megawatts allocated to IT load.^[2] That figure comes from the business press and was not part of the organization's own announcement.^[1][2] Power capacity of that scale is a defining specification for a data center, which distinguishes the building from ordinary office space, and it is the detail the business press leaned on in describing the site as a data-center acquisition.^[2]

Kyndryl carried the property under the Sterling Forest Business Resiliency Services Center name, a designation tied to the disaster-recovery and business-continuity services the site was built to provide.^[1][2] Jehovah's Witnesses have retired that operating name in favor of "Blue Lake," a reference the organization ties to the parcel's setting across the lake from its Warwick campus.^[1]

The price was not disclosed

Both Jehovah's Witnesses and the outlets covering the transaction reported the sale without a dollar figure.^[1][2] No purchase price appears in the jw.org announcement, in the Rockland County Business Journal, or in Religion News Service's coverage.^[1][2][3] The available public record establishes the parties, the property, and the closing date, but leaves the consideration undisclosed.

What the organization says it is for

The stated purpose comes from Jason Hohl, a spokesman for Jehovah's Witnesses in the United States.

The organization's announcement says Blue Lake will complement the nearby construction of the Ramapo Media Center, and it notes that the facility is not open for tours.^[1] Speaking to Religion News Service, the group said it is "still in the early stages of evaluating how the facility might best support future operations."^[3]

That framing — an official purpose stated in general terms, paired with an acknowledgment that specific uses are still being worked out — is the extent of what Jehovah's Witnesses have confirmed about the site's function.^[1][3] Reporters covering the deal characterize the acquisition as adding data-center or digital-infrastructure capacity, given the building's prior use.^[2][3] That characterization belongs to the business and religion press describing the property; it is not a use the organization itself has specified beyond Hohl's statement and the note about the Ramapo Media Center.^[1][2][3]

A decade of Hudson Valley expansion

The Rockland County Business Journal places the purchase within a pattern of property acquisition and construction the organization has pursued across the region for roughly ten years.^[2]

In 2016, Jehovah's Witnesses relocated their world headquarters from Brooklyn to Warwick, opening a campus of about 1.6 million square feet on some 253 acres at 1 Kings Drive.^[2] The move consolidated the organization's leadership in Orange County and established the Warwick campus that the newly purchased data center now sits across the lake from.^[1][2]

In 2021, the group purchased the Woodmont Hills rental complex — marketed as "Woodgrove at Sterlington" — a 384-unit residential property.^[2] More recently, the organization has had a large audio-visual production and media center under construction in the Sloatsburg and Ramapo area, on Sterling Mine Road, reported at about 1.5 million square feet and including residential units.^[2] jw.org refers to that project as the Ramapo Media Center, the same facility its Blue Lake announcement says the new data center will complement.^[1][2]

Seen against that record, the Blue Lake purchase adds a large, purpose-built technical facility to a Hudson Valley footprint that already spans a headquarters campus, residential housing, and a media-production complex.^[1][2] The business press frames the deal as a continuation of that expansion rather than a departure from it.^[2]

Where the story stands

The confirmed facts are narrow and consistent across the three sources. Jehovah's Witnesses, through the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, bought the former Sterling Forest Business Resiliency Services Center — now called Blue Lake — from Kyndryl, closing on June 26, 2026, for an undisclosed sum.^[1][2][3] The building spans about 432,989 square feet on roughly 68 acres across the lake from the organization's Warwick headquarters.^[1][2]

What the site will ultimately do remains, by the organization's own account, under evaluation. Jehovah's Witnesses say Blue Lake will support "Kingdom interests worldwide" and complement the Ramapo Media Center, while adding that they are still assessing how the facility might best serve future operations.^[1][3] The facility, the organization notes, is not open for tours.^[1]