The Buzz
NIPPING THE HAND THAT FEEDS YOU: We were a little startled to see, via the Rail Yards Blog of Friends of the High Line, that when the Wall Street Journal sent its architecture critic after the Hudson Yards developer proposals, she both hated them and tossed some of her harshest words toward the proposal by Steve Ross’ Related Companies, which proposes to house Journal owner News Corporation. “The Related Cos., with a drop-dead list of consultants, contributors, collaborators and anyone else who could be thrown into the mix (design teams can be camels, too), has covered all possible bases with something dreadful for everybody,” wrote Ada Louise Huxtable. “This is not planning, it’s pandering.” Huxtable had kinder words for the proposals from Steven Holl’s Extell Corporation, with its fanciful suspension-bridge towers, and for popular favorite Brookfield, which she praised for “addressing the huge variations in elevation from street to platform to waterfront, changes in grade that create a formidable barrier to the city around it. This is not easy to read in the models or in the other proposals with their emphasis on hype and heavyweight names.”
Overall, though, Huxtable’s analysis faulted not just the developers but the process itself. “If anything ever proved the old saw about committees and camels, it is the schemes for the extremely large and extremely lucrative redevelopment of New York’s Hudson Yards, the 28 acres on Manhattan’s far West Side currently up for sale by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to the bidder with the most financial allure and the best camel — oops, plan.”
NEW BEANS, OLD GUARD: Chelsea Now cheered when we first heard, back in December, that NYC was getting a Stumptown, part of the Portland coffee chain that fancies itself a sorta-grassroots alternative to Seattle’s Starbucks. A friend read aloud the NY Times doing the same: “The owner knows every person’s name. Each latte has a carefully designed pattern on the foam. For a single shot of espresso, the baristas will make it again for you if it’s not quite right — three, four, even five times while you wait,” and the Stumptown’s owner is known for personally traveling to places like Yemen in search of the best brew.” We were too busy staring at models for Hudson Yards to learn more — even that the Times helpfully mentioned its location, “at 29th and Broadway.” So we found out only last week that the good new beans will emanate from the “new” Ace Hotel, itself a West Coast boutique hotel chain. Ace began, publicist Ryan Bukstein told Chelsea Now on Monday, with a modest 28-room hotel, and then “got a lot of attention with a bigger hotel in Portland.” Now, he added, “we’re moving into the old Breslin Hotel.”
That’s right, the Hotel Breslin, whose conversion from modest SRO to boutique we’ve mainly covered from the flip side — as its current tenants, led by Legal Services of New York attorney Susan Cohen and tenants-association president Stephen Colvin, have been trying to challenge the conversion through the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD). According to Bukstein, Ace had first come to the hotel just as GFI Capital was hired by landlord Edward Haddad in 2005, “and we began to take a more active role last fall.” That included, according to the New York Observer, not just Stumptown but Rudy’s Barber Shop (like the one in the downtown L.A. Standard), and an eatery to be run by Ken Friedman, the co-proprietor of the Spotted Pig. “Ace is better than other places rock bands and starving designers stay in,” Friedman told the Observer, adding: “I like to go into historic buildings, maybe because I’m old.” We’re looking forward to hearing more next week when we meet with Bukstein and his boss, Ace owner Alex Calderwood. And we’re guessing we don’t have to warn them that the tenants still fighting the conversion are trying to live by the words of Yogi Berra, believing fervently that “it ain’t over till it’s over.”
TWILIGHT OF THE BOOKS. After closing the doors for the final time on its Astor Place location last week, Barnes & Noble now plans to shutter its block-long Chelsea store at 675 Sixth Ave. by springtime. The over 41,000-square-foot space, located along the so-called “Ladies Mile” stretch of Sixth Ave. between 22nd and 21st Sts., will close in March, according to the bookseller. Faith Hope Consolo’s team at Prudential Douglas Elliman is marketing the space for $200 to $250 per square foot, and has already fielded interest from cheap-chic retailers like Nordstrom Rack and Neiman Marcus Last Call, as well as home-furnishing outlets Gracious Home, Muji and CB2. The property could also be split for separate tenants, and Consolo added the landlord would prefer a long-term commitment for the space. She said a lease should be signed within four to six weeks.
Barnes & Noble acknowledged that high rents forced the multimedia retailer out of both locations, but the company did recently open a new store in Tribeca with plans for another on the Upper East Side.
“They just didn’t feel they wanted to spend anymore time here,” Consolo told Chelsea Now. “They felt that they had the area covered.”
