By Kim Velsey 5/10 8:18pm

Real estate kerfuffles

Not this again! (Getty)

Residents Evacuate Co-ops So That a New Crane Boom Can Rise At One57

Despite the rainy, windy weather that is set to hit New York tomorrow and a last-minute lawsuit filed to stop Extell from evacuating two co-op buildings adjacent to One57, plans to repair the crane broken during Hurricane Sandy are still moving forward Saturday morning.

Which means that the unfortunate residents of Alwyn Court, the landmarked building at the corner of Seventh Avenue and 58th Street, will either vacate the building voluntarily in the next few hours or face forcible eviction. The crane repair involves swinging a boom over Alwyn and two other buildings before hoisting it up the side of the unfinished tower. Read More

By Kim Velsey 2/13 10:30am

Grand Dames of Real Estate

8 Photos

Riverhouse Spread Asks $25 M.

River House Lightens Up About the Whole ‘Never Speak Our Name’ Thing

In the world of Manhattan co-ops, River House is the dowager queen: beautiful, powerful and regal, but not as beautiful, powerful or regal as she once was. For years, she has clung to her hidebound traditions—her exclusive club within a club, her distaste for all but the most financially-secure and publicity-averse residents, her refusal to let the building’s esteemed name be mentioned in conjunction with a sales listing—even, or perhaps especially, as her grip on the wealthiest, most influential sliver of Manhattan residents has slipped.

But now the Has Been, as this salmon-colored paper once crowned her, is finally making an attempt to reclaim the throne, Manhattan real estate chronicler Michael Gross reports. Mr. Gross, who recently penned an article in Avenue about the grand dame and her underpriced units, noted that one of River House’s apartments—a 16-room duplex in the tower—just came on the market asking $25 million. Read More

By Kim Velsey 11/26/12 1:19pm

Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

The billionaire's building.

Money and Manipulation: Documentary Takes On the Super-rich Residents of 740 Park

The opening shots of Park Avenue: Money, Power and The American Dream show the famed avenue in all its moneyed glory: idling Mercedes, impeccably coiffed society women and stern limestone facades with white-gloved doormen stationed outside like sentries. It is a vision so lofty that it is almost otherworldly—can the vast majority of Americans even conjure this up as the apex of the American dream, let alone attain it?

It’s a question that director Alex Gibney revisits repeatedly in his documentary about the growing gulf between the rich and poor and how that gulf has been widened by the political manipulations of the country’s wealthiest citizens. Read More

By Drew Grant 9/04/12 7:19pm

Fashion Week

Shalom Harlow of the Model Alliance (Jason Seiler)

The Sorrow and the Pretty: Model Alliance Looks to Empower the Ridiculously Good-Looking

On a rainy Wednesday evening in the middle of June, Sunshine Cinemas was bright with flashing bulbs as photographers snapped pictures of a gaggle of impossibly tall, impossibly beautiful women. The angelic onslaught was not a coincidence: they were all there to see a special screening of Girl Model, a documentary by Ashley Sabin and David Redmon that was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. Girl Model follows a 13-year-old Siberian girl who wins a modeling competition and is whisked off to Tokyo, where a modeling agency has promised her fame and fortune.

The documentary paints a grim, Dickensian portrait of the unpleasant, exploitative working conditions endured by some the world’s most attractive people; the situation depicted is not at all uncommon, and the audience, made up of dozens of models—blondes, brunettes, the occasional redhead—was rapt.

After the credits, French model Rachel Blais addressed the room. Her struggles are featured in the film, and she has become a spokesperson for better treatment for fashion models, traveling to screenings and other speaking engagements. Because of her outspokenness, she noted, she is now treated like a pariah. Read More

By Kim Velsey 6/04/12 7:47pm

Cheapskates

Who's paying to cut the grass?

New Yorkers Who Live By Central Park Stingy With Donations

New Yorkers who live on Central Park certainly reap the benefits of parkside abodes, especially when it comes to resale values, but they’re less than generous about giving back.

Only 17 percent of parkside denizens have donated to the Central Park Conservancy since 2010, according to a recent story in Crain’s by Michael Gross. And Mr. Gross, chronicler of luxury New York real estate and the author of consummate building biography 740 Park should know. Not only does Mr. Gross seem to have his eye on every move that uptown dwellers make, but he’s also a parkside resident himself. Read More

By Elise Knutsen 1/10/12 6:17pm

Machers

Michael Gross

Michael Gross Is Not Writing The Same Book Twice

When we heard Michael Gross was working on yet another book about an uber-rich New York residential building, our eyes rolled ever so slightly. The Observer had read and loved his opus on 740 Park (“The World’s Richest Apartment Building”), but with one in the works about 15CPW, titled The House of Outrageous Fortune,  what more could he possibly have to say about the nesting habits of the extraordinarily wealthy? Beyond what he had already written on the subject for us, of course.

A lot, it turns out. Read More

By Elise Knutsen 9/14/11 9:07am

Party Circuit

6 Photos

Sharon Bush, Christine Schott

Michael Gross Celebrates the Re-Release of Model: The Ugly Business of Beautiful Women

Last night, author Michael Gross celebrated the re-release of his acclaimed book Model: The Ugly Business of Beautiful Women. Guests included Sharon Bush, Lady Liliana Cavendish, Carmen Dell’Orefice, Matthew Settle, Anthony Haden-Guest and Nicole Miller.

The updated version of Model includes a new twelve page afterword called “The Last Word,” according to reports. The Read More