Critics often deride the buildings of Costas Kondylis as bland and developer-driven, putting price-per-square-foot above style or substance. But the architect, to whose credit it must be said has built far more in the city than probably all Pritzker winners combined, sees his conservative style of construction as more in line with the great Read More
Earlier this week, the Village got a new neighbor: Alec Baldwin bought a new downtown home at Devonshire House, taking over the massive duplex penthouse. He appears to be making room in the city’s hipper environs for his new girlfriend, Hilaria Thomas, who will likely prefer the neighborhood to his previous home in the star-studded 300 Central Park West.
It’s a well-worn path. Indeed, Mr. Baldwin is only the latest in a line of older uptown dudes to to head downtown in search of love. Read More
Not since David Lynch (tried) to adapt Dune for the screen has The Observer had such conflicted feelings about a movie: According to The Hollywood Reporter, Oliver Stone will adapt The Power Broker, Robert Caro’s epic 1,161-page door stop of glory, into an HBO special. Read More
Those email scammers sure are clever. Instead of continuing to make up foreign kings and dictators who have miraculously and mysteriously chosen you—yes, you!—for the riches they must now dispose of, they are using real, honest to god Americans, if slightly embellished, to attract patsies, err, investors.
Today, The Observer received one such email, with an offer to join “Mr. HARRY MACKLOWE, Biggest Land Owner of United State & Founder Chairman & Owner of Macklowe Properties” in an investment to establish a real estate investment in Bangladesh. Biggest Land Owner of United States? How could you say no! Still, something tells us Mr. Macklowe is plenty busy here at home, but in case you have a spare $2 million, we’ve included the details below. Read More
As has been rumored since talk began that Chris Ward would be departing the Port Authority some time this year, the Cuomo administration is poised to announce Patrick Foye will be taking over the bi-state agency as executive director, The Journal reports. Read More
When the Forbes 400 list of richy rich Americans came out last month, the richest New York developer was, as it’s long been, Richard Lefrak, with a net worth in excess of $5 billion. That is as much oil and natural gas wealth as it is development wealth—it’s all real estate, when you think about it—but perhaps Mr. LeFrak is feeling nostalgic, because he has decided to return to his home turf of Queens, according to The Journal. Read More
Tony Malkin may have lost his biggest fight, against Vornado’s Steve Roth and the gargantuan 15 Penn Plaza, but he’s having a good week, at least, winning two persnickety court battles. Read More
This comes from a story in The Journal today about Mr. Ross’ efforts to launch a fund to invest in troubled banks. It did not pan out, but it did present the editors over on Sixth Avenue with perhaps their best photo-op since the paper’s controversial Elena Kagan cover.
The sun was glistening off the blue glass of 3 Columbus Circle last Thursday. A clutch of nattily dressed real estate executives standing on the 19th floor terrace had to squint against the strong light, reflecting off the high-tech carapace of the building formerly known as 1775 Broadway. Once the headquarters of Newsweek, and before that General Motors, the building began life in 1928 as a sturdy Art Deco brick box towering over Columbus Circle. One of the biggest buildings in the city at the time, it was a show of emerging industrial might in the heart of Manhattan.
But that was before GM moved to the other end of 59th Street, erecting its glass and marble monolith. That was before the arrival of the Trump International, the Time Warner Center and the Apple store on Fifth Avenue. Glass has become big business across the city, where brick and steel still sometimes rules—the Empire State Building is still our most recognizable landmark. Glass was what Joe Moinian, the Iranian-Jewish developer, former cook and now master of some five million prime square feet, decided to go with, then. It was the boom-boom new millennium: Why tear down a perfectly serviceable building when you could simply sheath it in a slick new suit, ask those $100-per-square-foot rents (the standard for a top-of-the-line tower) and cash the checks? Read More
Even though he left the presidential race four months ago, Donald Trump is still taking pot-shots at the president. The latest is an unusual lease agreement at one of his properties, 40 Wall Street in Lower Manhattan. For the $176,000 deposit on a new 10 year lease, the Journal reports that the tenant will be handing over three 32-ounce bars of pure gold each “about the size of a television remote control.” (Would that be one of those big, multi-system ones, like you get with the cable box, or something slimmer?) Read More
