By Kim Velsey 2/06 10:23am

Manhattan Transfers

Impeccable and impeccably dull, all at the same time.

Bank of East Asia Exec David Li Bails Out of Time Warner Tower for $18.8 M.

Time Warner is not the only big fish cashing out on Columbus Circle. The Lincoln Square mega-development is also losing David Kwok Po Li, the CEO and chairman of Bank of East Asia and former Hong Kong politician, who has just sold his 72nd-floor condo. (Related honcho Kenneth Himmel also cleared out late last year.)

Nor is he the only one who stands to profit from the decision. While Time Warner is contemplating how much it could make by clearing out of its headquarters, a process that might well set off a bidding war, Mr. Li did very, very well, doubling his money in under a decade. Read More

By Kim Velsey 1/04 6:17pm

Playing favorites

Yeah, Gray has favorites.

One of Christopher Gray’s Favorite Buildings Is the Time Warner Center and Other Shocks In This Week’s Streetscapes Column

Apparently, we aren’t the only ones who have wondered what Christopher Gray’s favorite buildings are. In this week’s Streetscapes column, Mr. Gray admits that he’s frequently asked to name them. After all, an architectural historian who spends so much time not only staring at edifices, but researching their histories must have developed some strong Read More

By Roland Li 1/01 7:06pm

Westward Whoa!

hudson_park_block_3_big

Can Stephen Ross Make 11th Avenue the Next Hot Address?

On a recent evening at the 92nd Street Y, Stephen Ross, chairman of the Related Companies, reflected on four decades of transformation—for the city, where he has built more apartments than almost any other developer of his generation, and also for himself. In September, Mr. Ross, 72, stepped down as the CEO of the once-humble affordable housing outfit he transformed into a luxury real estate behemoth.

Not that he’s stepping aside. There he was a few weeks later, alongside Mayor Bloomberg and Council Speaker Christine Quinn on the formerly desolate Far West Side, breaking ground on the Hudson Yards project, a glass and steel city within a city that is actually larger, in terms of square footage, than downtown Portland or downtown Baltimore. Read More

By Kim Velsey 12/06/12 5:40pm

SKYSCRAPERS

A tale of two skyscrapers?

Duck! Has Mayor Bloomberg Softened His Stance on Wind-Related Construction Mishaps?

The sky may be the limit when it comes to constructing cloud-skimming Manhattan luxury condos, but when a storm strikes, it’s the sidewalks below that developers need to worry about. In the last month, our eyes and cameras were fearfully focused on One57′s dangling crane boom, but it’s not the first time that high winds have made it mortally dangerous to walk beneath an under-construction skyscraper. Back in April 2004, a freakish wind storm—gusts of 34 mph were recorded in Central Park—dislodged construction material from an upper floor of the still-under-construction Time Warner Center.

Perhaps the most remarkable difference between the two incidents was Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s reaction. In the case of the Time Warner Center, he chastised the developer and ordered work stopped immediately. After the One57 incident, he defended Extell, noting that high wind gusts often cause blameless accidents (which, to be fair, may well be the case and gusts during Sandy did reach 60 mph). Read More

By Kim Velsey 11/20/12 7:45pm

Manhattan Transfers

Ditto the bedroom. Maybe sleek glass just wasn't Mr. Himmel's speed.

Related Honcho Kenneth Himmel Sells Spread In Company’s Prized Time Warner Center

Can we really blame Kenneth A. Himmel for wanting to put the Time Warner Center behind him? The President and CEO of Related Urban spent years overseeing the skyscraper’s construction, then he moved into a three-bedroom condo on the 67th floor.

“Developing Time Warner Center was like climbing the mountain of mountains,” Mr. Himmel declares on Related’s website. We guess he also tired of climbing that same mountain day after day, even if it was in a super-sleek high-speed elevator. After more than a decade, the bloom was off the rose. Read More

By Kim Velsey 10/24/12 5:53pm

Stratospheric Sales

One57

Is One57 a Bummer Or a Boon for Nearby Condo Towers?

It has been, thus far, a year of almost incandescent hopes for the Manhattan luxury market. The $88 million sale at 15 CPW, the $70 million sale at the Ritz Carlton and rising like a beacon to the south, the unfinished One57 tower, with a penthouse in contract for more than $90 million.

Indeed, the market has burned so brightly for the owners of trophy and would-be and could-possibly-be trophy properties that it may even have blinded a few to the realities of the real estate market—while it could be described as magical, it is not magic. Is One57 a rising tide that will lift all boats (yachts?) or an ultra-luxury development that most other buildings breaking the skyline can’t compete with in finishes or prices? Or even worse: a view-blocker, shadow-caster and general reminder that places like the Time Warner Center and the Trump International are not as new as they once were? Read More

By Kim Velsey 4/25/12 12:37pm

Manhattan Transfers

7 Photos

Televangelists sell New York pad

Televangelist Creflo Dollar Sells Manhattan Condo

You can watch Creflo Dollar and his wife Taffi spreading the Word of God on TV seven days a week, but one place you won’t see the televangelists any more is at their 25 Columbus Circle condo.

The Dollars, preachers of the prosperity gospel and leaders of Georgia-based World Changers Church, have sold the two-bedroom condo on the 67th floor of the Time Warner Center for $3.75 million, according to city records. Read More

By Daniel Geiger 2/29/12 3:46pm

lease beat

Time Warner Center. (Courtesy Property Shark)

C. Wonder Deal Inked at Time Warner Center

C. Wonder, the preppy apparel and accessories retailer launched last year by designer Tory Burch’s ex husband, Christopher Burch, has signed on for a space at Time Warner Center, according to sources familiar with the deal.

The store, which opened another Manhattan store last October in Soho, will take about half of the roughly 15,000 square feet formerly occupied by the now-defunct bookstore chain Borders on the retail complex’s second floor. Read More

By Elise Knutsen 2/21/12 5:00pm

Manhattan Transfers

7 Photos

Acutely desirable property.

Hedgie Cashes Out of Time Warner Center for $19 M.

It seems that Michael Murphy tries very hard not to live his life in superlatives. His company, Rosecliff Capital, does not have a website open to the public and he can’t be found frolicking in any party pictures, flaunting his Wall Street wealth. The hedgefunder and Hofstra grad does, however, have a “superlative residence,” according to a recent listing, which has just fetched a superlative price. Mr. Murphy and his wife, Tracy, have sold their home on the 68th floor of the Time Warner Center for $19.45 million, city records show. Read More