No one gets in Madonna’s way, especially not some stuffy Central Park West co-op board. It appears the world’s most famous Anglophile pop star will get to expand her 6,000-square-foot fiefdom in the decidedly Victorian sounding building Harperly Hall.

The Material Girl has closed on the $7 million, 7th floor unit, according to city records published today, which will bring the swank duplex that has been her New York headquarters for the past two decades to positively palatial proportions.  read more »

New York suffered a brutal blow to its ego last week when Madonna said she was totally over Manhattan. “It’s not the exciting place it used to be,” the singer said. “It still has great energy; I still put my finger in the socket. But it doesn’t feel alive.”

So when The Observer found a real estate record filed just this morning that said Bono and his wife Ali Hewson had sold their Central Park West apartment, it seemed crushing. Could Madonna and Bono both be abandoning New York in the same short span? No.

According to the $4.9 million deed, the co-op is Bono’s old 2,322-square-foot apartment at the El Dorado at 90th Street and Central Park West.  read more »

New York Times publisher Arthur "Pinch" Sulzberger Jr. is not having a bright and shiny day. For one thing, the newspaper's buccaneer shareholder Harbinger Capital increased its pressure on the Sulzberger family's company by formally nominating its own four candidates to the paper's board of directors.

But in Manhattan, boardrooms aren't nearly as important as duplex co-ops. According to a deed filed in city records this afternoon, Mr. Sulzberger transferred ownership of his family's A-line duplex to his wife, the artist Gail Gregg, for $3,255,721. The apartment is in Harperley Hall, a stately pre-war co-op at 64th Street and Central Park West.  read more »

Broadway actor Frank Langella closed on a $2.1 million, fourth-floor condo at 336 Central Park West Tuesday, according to city records. Mr. Langella won a Tony last year for his portrayal of former president Richard Nixon in Frost/Nixon.

Two big sales in city records caught our eyes over the weekend, with price tags above $5 million (and, of course, one had to be in The Plaza):

• Lawyer Richard and Loretta Rosenbaum of Scarsdale purchased unit 703 in The Plaza for $8,741,976. We can't help but wonder how this suburban couple will get along with all the Russians. We have a call out to Mr. Rosenbaum.
• New York University Stern School of Business prof and Partner at Plainfield Asset Management Les Levi sold his 25 Central Park West condo for $7,060,000. The buyer is listed as Plutus NY, LLC.

Back in 1948, the radio bandleader Harry Salter and his wife Roberta Semple Salter, daughter of the scandalous California evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, moved into a rental at 322 Central Park West. About 15 years later, when the building went co-op, they paid $9,100 for the space.

Roberta died this January at age 96; and her family sold the six-room, 1,850-square-foot apartment for $2.95 million, according to deeds filed in city records this month.

“She decided to buy it against all advice,” Roberta’s daughter Victoria told The Observer last week. “Brokers, lawyers, friends, everybody said, ‘Roberta, you’re crazy’--because the Upper West Side was going to hell in a hand basket!” It turned out to be a good investment.  read more »

So far, the rumors of a Donald Trump-backed condo on the northwest corner of Central Park are greatly exaggerated.

Curbed related the rumor earlier this week that the Donald planned what would be one of the most significant residential developments in the city’s history because of its location along an edge of the iconic park that’s always seemed beyond the luxury pale.  read more »

At long last, steely Dateline NBC co-anchor Stone Phillips has sold his triplex penthouse at the Oliver Cromwell, an 80-year-old Central Park West co-op. Mr. Phillips’ six-room apartment was first listed back in fall 2005 for $5.5 million.

But, according to city records, Mr. Phillips 27th-floor apartment sold for a bit less--$4,350,000--to a fashionable buyer: Fred Gehring, CEO of the Tommy Hilfiger Corporation.  read more »