Other guests included Fern Mallis, Baroness Dini von Mueffling, Christy Turlington, Mickey and Leila Strauss, Jennifer Jones Austin and Bart Freundlich.

Ms. Amos strode in a half an hour late but made up for the lost time by speaking for almost an hour about the challenges specific to bringing humanitarian relief to Haiti, Libya, and Sudan, barely pausing to nibble at her Good Housekeeping-recipe popover. 

Hearst editorial director Ellen Levine asked about the challenges of negotiating with male leaders whose customs dictate they shouldn't shake her hand. 

"They don't expect you to be tough," said Ms. Amos. 

Longtime magazine fixture Christy Turlington was there to be, as Marie Claire's slogan goes, "more than just a pretty face." Ms. Turlington is taking a break from getting her master's in public health degree at Columbia in order to promote her first documentary, No Woman No Cry, about maternal health. It debuted on Oprah Winfrey's OWN network last month. 

That Marie Claire aims to incorporate more international news and longform journalism than their lady mag competitors speaks to Ms. Coles's background.  She was a career reporter before becoming the New York bureau chief of the Guardian and the Times of London. Plus, she's married to foreign correspondent Peter Godwin. Copies of his latest book, The Fear, were available for guests. 

After Ms. Amos cited a particularly grim figure about the frequency of lethal natural disasters increasing with global climate change, Ms. Coles cleared the air. 

"I don't know how you don't drink more alcohol," she joked.

Both she and Ms. Amos abstained from the white wine served. 

kstoeffel@observer.com :: @kstoeffel 

Rachel Zoe felt sorry for herself, but then she got her own reality show. [NY Post] 

Sheer is in for Spring. [The Cut] 

Editors at Justin Timberlake's William Rast show were disappointed upon learning that the pop star would not be performing for them. [WWD] 

Christy Turlington is studying "maternal and child health" at Columbia. [Vogue UK]

Guests at Thakoon's show today were furious as the show started almost an hour late due to Kanye West's late arrival. [WWD] 

Athletes like Maria Sharapova and Nastia Liukin are the new celebrities in the front rows of fashion week. [WWD] 

Uma Thurman may be expecting a child with fiancé Arpad "Arki" Busson. [NYDN]

Singer Natasha Bedingfield is engaged. [People]

Reforming playboy Fabian Basabe is opening a restaurant in Coral Gables, Fla. called Da Vittorio. [P6] 

Model Christy Turlington will be studying maternal and child health at Columbia University this fall. [NYDN, fifth item]

Equus star Daniel Radcliffe “loves Broadway." [People]

After a short "red carpet" arrival by celebs including Christy Turlington, Christie Brinkley, Abigail Breslin (publicist Lizzie Grubman informed The Daily Transom that Ms. Breslin was "not doing interviews"; she did, however, look adorable!), and a trio of Lohans--Ali, Dina, and Dakota, aka "Cody."

We caught up with the Lohan clan over pre- and post-concert snacks (thanks, Danny Meyer!). Ali seemed sullen; at 14, she is two years older than her sister Lindsay was when she had her first starring role, in The Parent Trap. (The younger Ms. Lohan is best known these days for her reality show, Living Lohan, in which she halfheartedly attempts not to become Lindsay, but not really.) She didn't say much, but Dina was a bit more talkative. "It's all for a great cause. So my son Dakota and my daughter Ali are here. We have a driver. [The Jonas Brothers] are so good live!" She was happy to learn that the brothers originally called New Jersey their home-"I didn't know they were from the East Coast. I'm from the East Coast!" and equally happy to proclaim that she would "definitely be a gymnast" if she were in the Olympics, because, she said, she used to dance.

Over 600 people (who had paid $1500 each to raise money for Ross) then packed into the gymnasium for the noon concert, which began with Kelly Ripa raffling off two guitars. Despite having performed in Los Angeles on Thursday, at Bryant Park on Friday morning, and at Jones Beach on Friday evening, the Jonas Brothers did not disappoint. In a Tinkerbell-with-clapping way, they survive on the screams of young fans; the louder crowd around us shrieked, the more energized the brothers became. Eventually, one imagines, they disappear in a puff of smoke.

Kevin, Joe, and Nick Jonas sang for a solid hour, rotating through time-tested moves such as jumping up and down rapidly, clapping, waving their arms in the air, and clutching their chests while looking longingly into the distance and singing plaintively to girls who broke their hearts via Instant Messenger. They all play guitar, both acoustic and electric (they have a roadie whose sole job is switching their guitars from the sparkly silver one to the faux Louis Vuitton-print one mid-song), and Joe rocked out several times on the tambourine while Nick also played drums and piano.

And so, as eight-year-olds danced on bleachers the way Gossip Girls dance on banquettes, and Dina Lohan eyed Kelly Ripa's back from five feet away, we found ourselves caught up in Jonas mania. Until, that is, Joe, the lead singer and middle brother, asked "Who's ready to go..." and we thought "Already? Well, it is a good beach day," but then Joe finished with: "to the year 3000." "The Year 3000" being one of their hit songs, and we, apparently, being a bit too old for the Jonas Brothers.

According to an invite, illustrated with an Obama portrait and bearing a "Carpooling Encouraged," reminder, co-hosts in alphabetical order include Alec Baldwin, Christy Turlington Burns & Ed Burns, Barbara Lee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and Carl Spielvogel, Laura Durning, Jason Epstein, Katie Lee and Billy Joel, Ellen Chesler & Matt Malow, Obama veteran donors Jay Johnson and Brian Mathis, Isaac Mizrahi, Gwyneth Paltrow, Rosie Perez, Jane Rosenthal, Russell Simmons, and Robert Zimmerman, among others.

The price is the usual $2,300 for admission, but Obama's appeal to the youth vote has hit the Hamptons too, and "specially priced" $1,000 tickets will be available for supporters between the ages of 16 and 25.

AMANDA: "Now....what do you think of this one?" says our would-be wedding coordinator, her painted eyebrows arching up to meet her gigantic hair. My mom shoots me a look of terror. The wedding coordinator is wielding a "storybook" photo album, akin to my eighth-grade yearbook. Glossy, stilted photos of the lovely couple are accompanied by romantic quotes like "Love at First Sight" and "Together Forever" in an array of many different fonts and colors. The bride and groom, in 1985 prom attire, beam underneath heavy heads of feathered hair. The three foot tall plastic Roman goddess statue that she was pushing for cocktail hour decor should have been our first clue.

As far as I can tell, these artificial, awkward and super-glossy photos run rampant in the wedding industry. Where is the photographer who will make us look like our own Christy Turlington/random hot guy Calvin Klein ad? You know the ones in black and white, where they are hanging out in bed or with their precious child on the beach? (For purposes of my fantasy, this doesn't also require a team of plastic surgeons.) I really hope we can find someone who will make us look, at the very least, like we're enjoying our wedding.

Christy Turlington and actor/director Ed Burns may have prolonged their

engagement, but they're still inching their way to the altar. In November, Ms.

Turlington put her five-story townhouse on West 11th Street, between Sixth and

Seventh avenues, on the market for $5.8 million.

The five-story house, an 1849 Greek Revival around the corner

from St. Vincent's Hospital, is as much of a looker as its owner. "It's

beautifully done," said a broker who recently toured the place. "Very serene,

very minimal," while incorporating "the original fiber of the house."

About 4,900 square feet, the townhouse has zone-controlled

central heat and air conditioning, a video security system, thermo pane windows

and elaborate wiring for stereo and cable equipment.

On the first floor is a guest apartment with a separate kitchen,

bedroom and living space, and French doors onto the landscaped garden-described

by brokers who have visited as "very green." The parlor floor has the main

kitchen, which overlooks the garden, and the living and dining rooms, each with

a fireplace. The master bedroom, with a terrace, is on the third floor; the

fourth floor has two guest rooms; and the fifth floor is occupied entirely by a

gym with a steam shower and a large tiled, planted roof deck-as if Ms.

Turlington weren't a fixture at Jivamukti Yoga across town.

According to city records, Ms. Turlington, who is the president

of Nuala Sportswear (which makes yoga-friendly duds) and the co-founder of

Sundari (a skin-care line), bought the place six and a half years ago-long

before she met Mr. Burns-for $1.5 million. The two were supposed to marry last

October in a star-studded wedding in Italy (Steven Spielberg was on the guest

list, and Bono was slated to give the bride away), but the wedding was

postponed after the Sept. 11 attacks and rescheduled for later this year.

Ms. Turlington's house came on the market just before the couple

closed on an $8 million deal to buy two adjacent triplex penthouses in a new

condo development on N. Moore Street in Tribeca. They paid $8 million for the

two properties, which, when combined, will amount to 7,500 square feet of

interior space, plus some outdoor space. Ms. Turlington's agent, Lisa Jacobson

at United Talent in Los Angeles, did not return phone calls, and her broker,

Judith Thorn of Ashforth Warburg, had no comment.

Real-estate sources say the groom is holding onto his bachelor

pad for now: a 2,400-square-foot loft at 20 N. Moore Street that he bought for

$2.4 million from the estate of John F. Kennedy Jr. two years ago. But heads

up, model magnets-they said he might rent it out.

Rudy's Room-inations

It has a Central Park view and space for the kids, sort

of, but the 2,400-square-foot penthouse apartment at 828 Fifth Avenue that

former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani inspected three times apparently had one major

flaw: not enough room to entertain.

Sources familiar

with the marketing of the $5.995 million co-op, near East 64th Street, said

that Mr. Giuliani decided against buying the apartment because it doesn't have

a separate dining room-though it does have a 700-square-foot living room and a

nearly 1,000-square-foot rooftop deck, accessed by a stairway.

Sources had thought the apartment wouldn't suit the

former Mayor for totally different reasons. Mr. Giuliani is in a bitter custody

dispute with his estranged wife, Donna Hanover, and this apartment is described

as "a perfect couple's apartment," with a master suite and only two nine-by-11

"guest bedrooms" to accommodate his two children.

But sources say that this wasn't the deciding issue for

Mr. Giuliani and his girlfriend, Judith Nathan. The couple also nixed an

apartment at 96th Street and Fifth Avenue that they checked out earlier this

month, but never bid on.

UPPER EAST SIDE

840 Park Avenue Four-bed,

four-and-a-half-bath, 4,000-square-foot co-op Asking: $7.5 million. Selling: $6.5 million Maintenance: $3,834; 39 percent tax-deductible. Time on the market: nine months.

CAN'T

WAIT TILL SPRING BREAK A real-estate executive looking for an apartment

with a "townhouse feel" signed a contract last August to buy this maisonette

apartment from a family with children. The family wanted to stay on until the

end of the school year-which had barely begun at that point-but the buyer

wouldn't go that far. They compromised on spring break as the date he'd take

possession. The private entrance of this duplex leads into a formal living area

with a wood-paneled living room-fireplace, mahogany pocket doors and all-and a

library. The 11-room place also has a formal dining room, a double-sized master

bedroom with his-and-hers dressing rooms, and three other bedrooms, each with

its own bathroom. Richard Steinberg of Ashforth Warburg represented the patient

buyer; the listing belonged to Sharon Baum of the Corcoran Group.

50 East 89th Street (Park Regis) Two-bed, two-bath, 1,050-square-foot co-op. Asking: $625,000. Selling: $605,000 Charges: $1,254; 55 percent tax-deductible. Time on the market: three and a half months.

OHM AERIE "It's a very serene apartment," said Julie Friedman, a broker at

Bellmarc Realty, of this two-bedroom apartment on a high floor of a postwar

co-op between Park and Madison avenues. She was referring to the

floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room and the walls sponge-painted in an

airy, neutral color. But despite the calming effects of the apartment and the

very recently retired seller's newfound love of running in Central Park, he and

his wife decided to move to Florida for some more serious relaxation. The

buyers, a couple living in the neighborhood, achieved that here. This place is

smaller and less complicated than what they're used to.

UPPER WEST

SIDE 310 West End Avenue Two-bed, two-bath, 1,350-square-foot co-op Asking: $799,000. Selling: $830,000. Charges: $1,495; 44 percent tax-deductible. Time on the market: seven months.

MR. MOM MOVES IN A recently divorced dad who sees his son every

day was crashing in a rental on the Upper West Side, while desperately looking

for a home away from home for him and his boy. He finally found this place, a

two-bedroom corner apartment near 75th Street. "It had tall ceilings, nice big

windows," said his broker, Joyce Weisshappel of the Corcoran Group. "It was

just perfect for him." He made an offer; the sellers, represented by Louise

Phillips of Insignia Douglas Elliman, accepted; but just before he signed a

contract, another interested buyer came in with a higher offer. A bidding war

began, and by the time it was over, the devoted dad had agreed to pay almost

$50,000 more than the original deal. "He just needed to settle down and get

something," said Ms. Weisshappel, "and this took us a long time to find." Not

surprisingly, the dad plans to move in immediately. Then father and son will go

about redecorating.

EAST MIDTOWN

308 East 50th Street Four-story, 4,000-square-foot townhouse Asking: $3.375 million. Selling: $3 million Time on the market: two months.

MICRODEVELOPERS GET

MACROPROFITS On July 26, The Hudson Development Group-architects and

construction managers who call themselves "microdevelopers"-bought this

townhouse, then configured as two duplex apartments, for $1.8 million. The next

week they began tearing stuff down to turn the place into a single-family home.

"We always try to expedite the process," said Gregory Bonsignore, managing

director of the group. This is the third townhouse project that Hudson

Development has undertaken in the two and a half years since the company was

formed. Their last project, a townhouse at 541 Hudson Street, eventually sold

to Amy D'Addario of the D'Addario family, which makes guitar strings. (She beat

out Tom Petty's daughter, Adria, for the house.) When this place was ready, it

was marketed by Wilbur Gonzalez of Insignia Douglas Elliman, and the British

and Irish consulates thought about buying it. Instead, a couple will use it as

their own New York embassy when they're in town.

TRIBECA 19 Beach Street Three-bed, two-and-a-half-bath,

3,000-square-foot condo Asking: $1.86 million. Selling: $1.8 million Charges: $970. Taxes: $172 Time on the market: one month.

DEALING

DOWNTOWN In one sense, Tribeca hasn't changed all that much since Sept. 11.

According to Katherine Gauthier of Insignia Douglas Elliman, three of the six

full-floor lofts in this building have been sold to people who work in

investment banking-all in their 30's, all new to the neighborhood. Then again,

the fourth buyer is a couple with two kids who are not new to the neighborhood.

They had been living in a two-bedroom apartment in the Ice House, 27 N. Moore

Street, just around the corner from this building, and needed more space. They

were walking by this building when they saw a sign advertising lofts for sale

there. Each apartment has three bedrooms, a fireplace, high ceilings and lots

of windows-a nice change.

Hampshire house in the hot seat

One of the few residential buildings involved in the

recent scandal in which city assessors took bribes to lower property taxes is

Hampshire House, a hotel turned co-op at 150 Central Park South, where Frank

Sinatra and Ava Gardner-and, more recently, Rupert and Anna Murdoch-once lived.

But according to records, the scam didn't appear to pass any savings onto

residents via lower monthly maintenance costs, which cover property taxes.

According to the federal indictment handed down Feb.

25, two city tax assessors took payments amounting to a bit more than $5,000 to

lower Hampshire House's real-estate tax assessment leading into the 2000 tax

year. But in fact, the records show the assessed value of the building for 2002

at $13.77 million-only about $300,000 higher than the assessed value of the

building in 1991. Over the last five years, most comparable buildings (i.e.,

former hotels) have had their assessments increase by at least that much each

year. In 1995, the city assessed the value of the Sherry-Netherland, 721 Fifth

Avenue, at $16.38 million; by July 2000, the figure had gone up to $18.22

million. The Beekman, 575 Park Avenue, was assessed in 1995 at $6.89 million;

by 2000, it was $8.376 million.

Maintenance charges at Hampshire House have indeed gone

down over the last five years-but according to sources close to the building,

it's not from phony tax assessments. The building started taking steps to

control maintenance costs and make apartments more attractive in the mid-90's:

Linen and bed turn-down services and the use of the building's staff kitchen

and dining room were cut back, and those services were made optional. Said

Scott Durkin, chief operating officer of the Corcoran Group, who sold Alice

Tully's mammoth penthouse at Hampshire House in 1995 for $3.9 million: "This

cut the maintenance costs considerably; Tully's maintenance was $23,500 per

month … and it went down to $16,500," he said.

By early 2000, those efforts were paying off. The

Murdochs sold their 24th-floor apartment facing Central Park-with two bedrooms,

two baths, a library and a grand entrance gallery-for $5.3 million. The

maintenance on the apartment was $7,293.

The benefits of the phony tax assessments do not appear

to have set in yet. The Department of Finance phases in assessment changes over

a five-year period-and in an up market, this usually means gradual increases.

At Hampshire House, it would have meant the opposite if the scam had not been

uncovered.

"Five years on, you start to see the effect," said one

real-estate lawyer.

This is not your 90's variety Steinberg clan.

In late May, as Manhattan emptied into the Hamptons and Saul and Gayfryd Steinberg held a fire sale of gilded furnishings at Sotheby's, the Steinberg family sold its share of Reliance Group Holdings, the company that had made them billionaires. With poor earnings stretching back a year or so, the extended clan has been downshifting since the beginning of the year into a new life as millionaires.

"The family's pot of gold is greatly diminished," said a source familiar with the clan.

Saul Steinberg, the former chairman of Reliance Holdings Group, and his wife, Gayfryd, hawked their prized triplex penthouse, the former home of John D. Rockefeller, in late February for $37 million, the highest price ever paid for a Manhattan co-op apartment. While living in a three-bedroom apartment at the Helmsley Carlton House, a hotel on Madison Avenue near 61st Street, they are in the market for a $10 million townhouse, brokers say.

But at that price, nothing seems to suit them. Aside from East 62nd Street, the couple has passed on a four-bedroom house at 16 East 69th Street being sold by the English Speaking Union for $9.2 million and 15 East 80th Street, a five-story, 21-foot wide, 8,400-square foot house with a $7.5 million price tag.

"They have not bought a townhouse yet," said a broker.

The sell-off has spread to Mr. Steinberg's sister and brother-in-law, Ronni and Bruce Sokoloff, who sold their five-story townhouse at 16 East 68th Street for $10.5 million on April 12. The buyer is Robert McKeon, president of New York merchant bank, Veritas Capital.

One broker told The Observer that the townhouse, which was never officially on the market, had an accepted offer in "2.5 seconds!"

"It was sort of a classic townhouse that [Mr.] Sokoloff had upgraded in terms of plumbing, wiring–everything was pretty much intact," said Leslie J. Garfield, who own a realty firm which specializes in townhouses.

Mr. Sokoloff bought the 21.6-foot-wide, 78-foot-deep townhouse in 1997 for $6 million from the estate of Mrs. William D. Bell, whose father built the house in 1922. It features two elevators, fireplaces, a library, four bedrooms and two bathrooms. The real estate taxes are $42,000.

Mr. Sokoloff, 51, remains the senior vice president of administrative services of Reliance Group, the insurance company founded by Mr. Steinberg. The Sokoloffs have moved to a rented apartment on the Upper East Side. They did not return calls for comment, nor did Mr. McKeon.

The family's financial crisis has meant riches for Kathy Steinberg, a real estate broker who works for Edward Lee Cave and the ex-wife of Saul's only brother, Robert Steinberg, she has emerged as Saul and Gayfryd's exclusive broker, despite talk that her relationship with the couple had cooled off. She is not on as good terms with the Sokoloffs, who gave their business to Ms. Steinberg's colleague Linda Stein, also a broker at Edward Lee Cave.

Robert, or Bobby, the former president of Reliance Group, was fired by his brother last November when things at Reliance began to look seriously bad. Since divorcing Kathy about seven years ago, Bobby has sold the apartment they shared at 944 Fifth Avenue to Hollywood producer Peter Guber for $7 million and another home designed by Charles Gwathney on Lily Pond Lane in East Hampton. He has been living in a house in northern New Jersey and renting a pied-à-terre at 211 East 70th Street. Kathy lives in a $2.25 million six-room penthouse at 1 East 66th Street.

TRIBECA

AT J.F.K. JR.'S LOFT, IT'S OFFICIAL, ED BURNS IS IN, HEATHER GRAHAM IS OUT For the record, filmmaker Ed Burns got the keys to the former loft of John F. Kennedy Jr. at 20 N. Moore Street on May 9, just two weeks after he was approved by the building's co-op board and about the same time he and actress Heather Graham split.

While angling for the title of Hollywood's "it" couple in April, Mr. Burns and Ms. Graham took a tour together of the 2,400-square-foot penthouse apartment with a private elevator and a wall of windows to the east. To observers, they seemed almost beautiful enough to inherit the former home of Kennedy and his wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, the late Prince and Princess of Tribeca.

But then it seemed like someone yelled, "Cut!" The co-op board's president, Ruth Hardinger (a real estate broker with Douglas Elliman) had already unofficially rejected one buyer, a foreign businessman who offered to pay cash, but who only wanted the place as a pied-à-terre . The board didn't want a part-time owner, and actors, directors and writers like Mr. Burns are known to be on location.

Residents said the financial security of the building–which is partly based on having a high percentage of owners in residence–was the only issue, despite reports indicating that Mr. Burns was being summarily dismissed. "We're not thrilled to have lots of attention," said one tenant who was tormented when people mourning Kennedy and his wife made pilgrimages to the address last year. On the other hand, in February, the co-op made talk-show host David Letterman, an owner in the building for the past 10 years, grovel before them in order to buy his third apartment in the building–that of Larry Everston, owner of Tootsi Plohound shoe stores–in February, while recovering from quintuple-bypass surgery.

In the meantime, the actress and the director reportedly went their separate ways. On June 8, a resident of 20 N. Moore told The Observer that Mr. Burns, a Queens native, had already moved in–alone. He bought his new apartment, on top of the nine-story building near Varick Street, for just under the $2.4 million asking price, said brokers. Mr. Kennedy bought it for $700,000 in 1994. Stephen McRae and Debby Korb of Sotheby's International Realty sold the apartment on behalf of Mr. Kennedy's estate, and Halstead Property Company represented Mr. Burns.

Apparently, the co-op board will be flexible on one thing: They'll consider giving over the building's roof to Mr. Burns for the right price.

SOHO

THE MODELS HAVE LEFT THE POLICE BUILDING In the late 80's, when supermodels reigned, the troika of Cindy Crawford, Christy Turlington and Linda Evangelista flocked to Soho's Police Building in catwalk lockstep, each forking over a couple of days' pay to gain another asset. The threesome made the building famous, despite the often unwielding layouts of most of the former police headquarters' apartments. But the models are all gone now, and the building's 15 minutes are over.

On June 2, Ms. Turlington, who bought a townhouse in the West Village several years ago, sold her sixth-floor apartment at 240 Centre Street for $850,000. The 31-year-old yoga addict had been renting out the 1,500-square-foot, two-bedroom, two-bathroom duplex co-op apartment for almost four years. She put it on the market in mid-January for $875,000. In just a few days, a "single and cute" businessman in his late 20's had signed a contract, said a broker. Ms. Turlington couldn't be reached for comment and her broker, Linda Gertler of the Corcoran Group, wouldn't comment on the deal.

Ms. Crawford got out of the Police Building in 1998, when she sold her fourth-floor apartment for $685,000; she now lives on Park Avenue. And Ms. Evangelista fled too; she has been renting out her apartment while living in France. These days, the building is only famous for the 2,500-square-foot, three bedroom apartment directly under the building's dome, which is supposed to resemble the Hotel des Invalides in Paris. It has a 25-foot-high living room with 12-foot windows and was purchased for $1.8 million in 1998 for Saturday Night Live co-producer Marci Klein, whose father, Calvin Klein, writes some of Ms. Turlington's paychecks.

GREENWICH VILLAGE

2 Fifth Avenue

3-bed, 2-bath, 1,600-square-foot co-op.

Asking: $965,000. Selling: $940,000.

Charges: $1,650; 12 percent tax deductible.

Time on the market: One week.

RAISING KIDS ON THE SET OF KIDS This may be the perfect New York City address–directly across the street from Washington Square Park, at the beginning (or the end, depending on where you sit) of Fifth Avenue–if you can wait long enough. A father of three who works on Wall Street did, first for this three-bedroom apartment on the 16th floor, and possibly for the smaller apartment next door. "A lot of people are buying up apartments to the left, to the right, above and below, to stay in this building," said Janet Weiner, a senior vice president at the Halstead Property Group, the broker for the Wall Streeter and the seller of the three-bedroom unit. The board doesn't seem to mind. "They want families in the building," she said. Then what is Ed Koch doing living here?

CARNEGIE HILL

25 East 92nd Street

Five-and-a-half-story, 6,500-square-foot brownstone.

Asking price: $5.7 million. Selling price: $4.7 million.

Time on the market: 10 days.

TEN-YEAR ITCH In 1969, real estate veteran Leslie J. Garfield sold this 20-foot-wide brownstone between Fifth and Madison avenues to a young couple for $225,000. Ten years later, when their kids were grown, the couple decided to chop the building up into five separate units, turn it into a co-op and sell off the apartments; they made more than $400,000 in the process. Now, with the rich scouring the city for ever-larger mansions, every shareholder in the co-op has agreed to sell out to a Wall Street couple who will reunite the separate floors. Around the same time and one block away, another 20-foot house, which had been carved into two duplex apartments, was purchased for $4.2 million by a couple expecting a baby; they, too, will restore their place to a single residence. The frenzy has raised the high price for townhouses on this block–despite the neighborhood uproar over the proposed construction of a high-rise on the corner of Madison Avenue and 92nd Street–to $6.6 million. It even lured Woody Allen, who purchased a five-story home one block east last year.

GRAMERCY PARK

136 East 19th Street (Gramercy Mews)

Three-bed, 2.5 bath, 2,500-square-foot condo.

Asking: $2.1 million. Selling: $1.86 million.

Charges: $1,018. Taxes: $1,605.

Time on the market: Four months.

CO-OPTING THE MAISONETTE Having cheaply imitated every other aspect of the prewar co-op down to the mail chute, today's condominiums have gone after the exalted maisonette, using the term to describe every variety of first-floor duplex apartment. The term was first associated with the vertical, townhouse-like apartments with entrances off the lobby of a 1920's or 30's co-op building (the type of residence fit for the William F. Buckleys and the Tina Browns). In 2000, "maisonette is just a glorified word for first-floor living," said one broker. "Nobody wants to say they live on the first floor." (Remember when buildings had only one penthouse apartment?) This recently completed building consists of five apartments fabricated out of two side-by-side townhouses. This "maisonette" has a library with a fireplace, a small powder room, a kitchen and a dining room that leads out to a greenhouse and then a 400-square-foot backyard on the first floor. Upstairs are a master bedroom with floor to ceiling windows, two smaller bedrooms and a tiny laundry room. The sale, which closed in June, was co-brokered by Kathy Sloane (Hillary's broker) of Brown Harris Stevens and Joan Kaplan of the Sunshine Group. The new owners are a couple of out-of-towners. The rest of the building is one other "maisonette" with a similar layout, an apartment occupying the entire third floor and two duplex penthouses (yes, two) on the fourth and fifth floors.

I crossed the street to investigate. Sure enough, the store was dark, the rotisserie still, and the deli case, once laden with cauliflower soufflé, sour pickles and creamy caraway-seed coleslaw, lay barren. An official notice of possession hung in the window next to a flier, which now had a time-capsule quality to it: "Today's special vegetable-braised leeks."

For me, David's Chicken evokes almost Proustian memories of yesteryear. I first discovered their birds when I was writing a magazine profile of Donna Karan back in the 80's. The assignment provided several notable sensory experiences. One of them was standing backstage on top of a table, clutching my reporter's notebook during Donna's fall show, watching such supermodels as Christy Turlington, Elle MacPherson and Cindy Crawford undress. Another was tasting David's Chicken for the first time the night before, when Donna ordered it for her staff as they helped her put the finishing touches on her collection. Suffice it to say that between Christy Turlington's and David's, I became something of an expert on what constitutes a good breast.

As I stood before David's window now, homebound pedestrians stopped to mourn with me. "I'm going to miss them," a middle-aged lady said.

"Maybe I'll start cooking instead," mused a young businessman.

I wasn't willing to let David's out of my life so easily. I called Roberta, the rental agent whose phone number was taped to the window for anybody interested in leasing the space.

Roberta didn't share my grief. "You're very lucky," she said. "The place was closed down by the Department of Health. It was infested with roaches and mice and rats. They were also closed down for nonpayment of rent. They left owing a lot of money, and they left making a lot of people sick."

"Who?" I challenged. Certainly not I.

"My husband, for one," Roberta snorted. "The last time I ordered, my husband got very sick."

Ely Samuels, the property's managing agent, was similarly unsympathetic. "They left owing over $100,000 in back rent," he said. "We always had trouble getting the rent. It was not a recent phenomenon." But what about the food, I asked. Surely, one should make an exception for anybody with the talent to make a bird that moist with skin that crispy.

"I eat kosher," Mr. Samuels explained. "They didn't have any rabbinical supervision."

Roberta had, perhaps unintentionally, raised an interesting philosophical question-or at least as close as most New Yorkers get to one in these hedonistic times: If a takeout place is infested with roaches, but you don't know about it, and the food tastes great and you don't get sick … does it really matter?

Frankly, I wasn't sure how I felt. So I called the Department of Health for the details about David's violations. An improperly displayed city permit would be one thing, rats the size of cocker spaniels roaming the basement quite another. A health department staff member offered to fax me the citations, but warned that they were voluminous; she put them in the mail instead.

Where should I begin? On May 6 of this year, mouse droppings "in abundance" were noted in the walk-in refrigerator. As it turned out, the mice were as fond of David's baked turkey as I was of their roast chicken. The health inspectors spotted "gnawed" marks on the birds.

On one visit in February, the inspectors detected a "very strong and offensive urine odor"-as opposed to a subtle and fragrant one, I suppose-in the basement near where the canned goods were stocked. They also discovered Do It All germicidal foaming cleansers, Tat house and garden insect killer, and something called Bondo, an auto body sealant, sharing a shelf with food. As a New Yorker who lives in an apartment with limited shelf and closet space, this was a transgression I was willing to forgive. But the live roaches the inspectors surprised near the Hobart oven unit in the kitchen during an October visit, the same day they spotted rat droppings in the basement and came across an odor possibly rising from dead vermin, gave me pause.

For the first time, I began to contemplate the previously unimaginable-that even if David's reopened at a new location, as somebody next door at Garlic Bob's told me he'd heard they were going to do, I might switch my business to Dallas BBQ, where you get half a chicken, French fries and corn bread for less than the cost of just the chicken at David's. But loyalty and years of finger-licking prevented me from defecting until I'd spoke with David Denowitz, the store's founder, and gotten his side of the story.

I reached him in Boca Raton, Fla., where he runs another David's Chicken. I wanted him to reassure me that I wouldn't be risking cholera the next time I bit into one of his wings. David started by thanking the community for their outpouring of support and announced he hoped to be back in business on the Upper East Side before the Jewish holidays.

I asked about the vermin problem. David blamed it on the landlord who, he charged, hadn't made needed repairs to the subbasement. What of Roberta's charge that the place was filthy? "The place wasn't filthy," David sighed. "The place was tired." He didn't deny they owed the landlord around $100,000. "We were trying to force their hand," he explained. "It didn't work. We decided to vacate the premises."

"Citarella didn't put us out of business," he went on. "They brought more people to the street. We were doing better business than before."

My conversation with David left me less than confident. I decided to call Patti Cohen, Donna Karan's amanuensis, to help me through my pain. Patti started laughing when I mentioned David's Chicken. They hadn't ordered from there in years . "We're much more health-conscious," she said. "Now it's chopped vegetables and grilled fish and chicken. It's the 90's now."

A brief, bittersweet silence passed between us as Patti and I thought back to the good old days before Donna went public, and I reminisced about a time when a reporter could stand on a table ogling the world's most famous models with impunity.

"You just whet my appetite," Patti admitted. "Even back then I used to take off the skin, even though that's the best part. I loved their coleslaw and their pickles. I'm starving."

Me, too. Except maybe for beef.