Holiday Inn Hotels & Resorts
Tuesday: The Engima of Affordability! Plus, Jay McInerney On Elaine's & Michael's
Dr. Jay
- Jay "Brat Pack" McInerney makes a brave, bloggerly expedition into Manhattan's most writerly restaurants. He reports that Michael's is still popular for lunching Jews ("the tribe," Jay?). Likewise, he says the boozy Elaine's has not been "plausibly supplanted as a writer's watering hole." Here's evidence to the contrary: Norman Mailer is gone, Brian Glazer is there instead. (House & Garden)
- To make you feel worse about Manhattan, The Times continues its year of dour realty news with a piece on rising housing costs. Things are bad everywhere, yet in New York "more than half of all renters now spend at least 30% of their gross income on housing, a percentage figure commonly seen as a limit of affordability." Maybe a burst bubble wouldn't be so terrible after all. (NY Times)
- Magazine Profile of the Month: Meet Keith Granet, who represents the stars of interior design. How will his magic touch benefit New York? Get ready for Charlotte Moss on Madison Avenue, then a SoHo antiques boutique for Monique Gibson, "Elton John and Jon Bon Jovi's designer." Plus: Mr. Granet hates Target. (Interior Design)
- Sign #28941 that the Financial District is resuscitating: Holiday Inn Wall Street has been bought by a luxury hotelier. (If you're a broker in the market for a convenient one-nighter, get excited for the upcoming "renovation--and more.") (Globe St.) - Max Abelson read more »
Monday: Gowanus Is Not Park Slope, Tribeca Is Not Jersey, SoHell Is Not Hell?
Brooklyn's new Holiday Inn
- The Jack Parker Corporation is trying to rezone north Tribeca--from manufacturing into residential--so that it can put up a hefty, dense apartment building. If you live in the area, you're probably complaining about damage to "low-rise character" or to waterfront views. And you're probably rich, too: the neighborhood proudly claims the "city's wealthiest zip code," even though just 18% of the land is zoned for residential housing. Jack Parker is salivating. (New York Sun)
- The Gowanus Holiday Inn is open, so everyone can get his $139-per-night Gowanus fix! The Times halfheartedly points out that "most people still aren't calling [the area] Park Slope." Mightn't that be because Gowanus is (still) not Park Slope? (New York Times)
- The Hamptons won't be officially dead until the H-word is no longer meaninglessly dropped in the lede sentences of big Post articles on international business deals. Or maybe the Hamptons has already died and gone to Purgatory. (New York Post)
- New York says "you might want to spend some time in" in the avant garde-heavy, friendly bar-happy 'hood below Hell's Kitchen. Why? Because it's SoHell. (New York)
- It's old news, but it's good news: New York does not qualify as a "wellness community." This has something to do with "germs" and "full-body age assessments," and possibly people named bubble sitters. (CNN/Money) - Max Abelson read more »
Tuesday: Bizarre Emails! Bribery! Death! Another Day In NY Real Estate
Stubbins shines on.
- It takes The Times ten reporters to write a story on Dr. Nicholas Bartha, the man suspected of annihilating his Upper East Side townhouse in a suicide attempt. But the article's most fascinating anecdote--Bartha's last-minute note to Prudential Douglas Elliman VP Mark Baum--was broken yesterday on The Real Estate. Interestingly, Dr. Bartha also CC-ed Fox News' Sean Hannity, Governors Pataki and Schwarzenegger, and (of course) his ex-wife. (The New York Times)
- Hugh Stubbins Jr., architect of New York's famously sharp and free-flowing Citigroup Center, is dead at 94. His last building, Yokohama's Landmark Tower (above), is Japan's tallest.(New York Times)
- Asking a developer to build you a $500,000 "dream home" is a great idea. Unless, of course, you're a state assemblyperson, and you want the house "for little to nothing" in exchange for steering "a city-owned vacant lot" in Brooklyn to your developer. (To make matters worse, the lot was meant for affordable housing.) But Assemblywoman Diane Gordon's attorney swears "she never profited one cent from this," which will probably prove true. (AP, via NY Daily News)
- In two weeks, Holiday Inn Express says it will open a 115-room hotel in Park Slope. The problem (besides the obvious issue of Brooklyn Holiday Inn Expresses), is that the new hotel is in Gowanus. The company insists: "it really is" in Park Slope - "it's on the border." Maybe these folks should solve their neighborhood issues before they open that second Brooklyn hotel. (NY1)
- Get excited for public-record co-op sales. Get very excited. Then get concerned, because "the Department of Finance wants to make all real-estate transactions transparent." (New York Magazine) - Max Abelson read more »
Altar Angst? Cyber-Rabbi to the Rescue!
A few weeks ago, my good friend Sarah and I were sitting in her Perry Street apartment, watching rad read more »
