As the legend of the Hotel Chelsea evaporates (allegedly!), one Mr. Andre Balazs may be interested in stepping in and reviving what's left of the institution... or at least capitalizing on its history while marketing it towards a celebrity crowd. According to Page Six the hotelier was spotted in the lobby and meeting with management last week (he's eyed the place in the past, too). more ›

Courtney Love has been threatening to leave Twitter all weekend—let's hope it's because she's actually, like, happy, thus shedding the need for an online public outlet in which to vent. The Daily News reports that one of her recent Twitter victims, ex-boyfriend Edward Norton (who she called out for owing her money), has gotten back in her good graces (because, whoops, he didn't actually owe her anything) and may be acting as a mediator on some level between Love and Frances Bean. more ›

After weeks of trying to make it work, Robert Valin has given up on what would have been his annual West Village Leather & Bear Street Fair. The bears were thwarted when the Standard's Andre Balazs said the fair would clash with the image of his precious hotel (even though it's known for baring it all). The Food & Wine Festival is also taking place in the area that weekend, and the executive director said "next year we can all work together and coordinate." That'll be an interesting crowd! [Scoopy's Notebook via Curbed] more ›

Andre Balazs of the Standard Hotel claims he's not the one behind keeping the West Village Leather & Bear Street Fair off his turf. After reports came in that the hotelier was anti-Bear (despite fully supporting his guests baring it all for visitors of the High Line), he now says it's the mayor's fault! His hotel is actually "headquarters for the big NYC Wine and Food Festival happening that same weekend, so the mayor's office wants the bears to reschedule." Robert Valin, executive director of the Leather Weekend, told the Villager that the "hotel’s managing director, Ian Nicholson, reached out to him, and that a sit-down was set for this week. The hotel people now claim they had no idea the leather fest was being booted off the block—though Valin the previous week had told us the Mayor’s Office clearly said the hotel didn’t want the S&M confab there." Looks like no one wants to be on the bear's bad side! As for staying at the hotel, Valin told the paper: “I think I would request that the bears get higher floors—we are sexual men." [via Curbed] more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a shooting on 120th St. and 3rd Ave. in Manhattan, a stabbing on West 31st St. in Brooklyn, and a fall victim at MoMA in Manhattan.
• The New York Yankees took first place in franchise spending, with a total payroll of $218.3 million last year. The World Series-winning Boston Red Sox payroll totalled $155.4 million to finish a distant second.
• The New York Water Taxi is terminating its South Brooklyn service between Sunset Park, Red Hook, and Wall St. at the end of this month.

Prefab housing isn't just for the..."thrifty" anymore! Yesterday Wired featured a selection of twelve modular, prefab housing units -- from lofts to place atop city skylines to 60 square-foot cabins with "cathedral ceilings". more ›

Back in May we asked what you thought of a Sex and the City movie, 51% of you thought it was coming three years too late. Whether we like it or not, the movie is going to happen - after Kim Cattrall finally signed on. Word is that she wanted a higher salary and a deal for a future HBO show, both of which she got. Guess her post-Samantha days haven't been filled with great roles (see: Ice Princess with Michelle Trachtenberg). more ›

All sorts of people have been showing up at the Hotel Chelsea, or writing in, to express their thoughts on "new management". It was only a matter of time before Ethan Hawke stopped by (and we're glad he did)! more ›

Uma Thurman's ex and Cameron Diaz's latest maybe love interest, hotelier Andre Balazs, was the high bidder. Though he has no immediate plans for it, he said "it belongs back in the tropics.'' We think he should keep it in LIC (where it's been on view since May 17th) and make it a green boutique hotel. more ›

New York City (and Mayor Bloomberg’s 2030 strategists) now can breathe a sigh of relief: Gotham is getting its first luxury green hotel. more ›

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A(nother) pedestrian struck on Bruckner Boulevard in the Bronx, high carbon monoxide readings in Queens and a technical rescue in Manhattan
• That big six-alarm apartment building fire in Queens last month? It turns out a man who was squatting there with his girlfriend purposefully set a fire in a closet "hoping to dissuade her from using drugs and engaging in prostitution there."
• A metal beam falls from scaffolding and hits someone on the head in Midtown

It is a day for rodents, that's for sure. To the excitement of Big Apple animal lovers, the NY Times reported the first beaver in 200 years has been spotted in the city. A 2- or 3-year-old beaver has been seen in the Bronx River, doing one of two very New York things: Looking for a mate or trying to make his home better (the Times says he was spotted "looking for more material to insulate its home"). more ›

+ The old Cabrini Stuyvesant Polyclinic on Second Ave., an 1883 landmark building, could be "dormed" if Landmarks approves. (Props to Villager reporter Bonnie Rosenstock for writing "the East Village is turning into the Village of the Dormed" and inspiring us with some Halloween ideas.) more ›

High Line photos aren't exactly rare, but, since we happened to be on a nearby roof recently, we took a few. more ›

Police believe that Imette St. Guillen, the John Jay College graduate student who was murdered last Saturday, was probably targeted by a stranger. After confirming that St. Guillen was last at The Falls, a restaurant and bar on Lafayette Street just south of Spring (near the Andre Balazs Kenmare Square development, across the street from La Esquina) where she headed after the Pioneer Bar, witnesses say she left the restaurant alone. The current theory: A fake livery driver picked up St. Guillen around 4AM - especially considering how easy it seems to be to pose as a livery driver (just a few weeks ago a woman was assaulted by someone she thought was a livery driver). People in SoHo were surprised, with one resident told WABC: "It's surprising that this is something that happened in this part. Down Bowery and down Canal it gets sketchy." Well, unfortunately anything goes - just because a neighborhood is gentrified doesn't mean there isn't crime. Criminologists and experts have been weighing on all media outfits on the grisliness of the murder - and what it means about the killer - here's one look. more ›