Results tagged “bubble”

Has the Super-real estate market finally encountered economic kryptonite? Manhattan's housing market has seemed utterly impervious to any hint of real estate meltdown, even as other boroughs have suffered mortgage foreclosures at four times the national average. But one can't pass a Chase bank branch or a Duane Reade before coming across yet another building going up or being retro-fitted as luxury condos. The New York Times has an article today indicating that the gilded age of upper-crust real estate may be losing its luster.

(fishbowl, vol. 3, by hbomb1947 at flickr)

A while ago when Gothamist got wind of TKettle, a spot on St. Marks that promised bubble tea, dumplings and Korean fried chicken, we were tempted to place it in the same category as many Chinatown spots trading in savory snacks and bizarre boba drinks. The appeal of slurping chewy gelatinous globes through an oversized straw has always proved elusive, but we harbor no such prejudices against fried chicken or dumplings. Additional reports about succulent...

According to Turkey Carving for Dummies, every year hundreds of thousands of people wind up in hospital emergency rooms as a result of kitchen accidents involving knives. Don’t become a statistic! In yesterday’s article about the best way to carve the turkey, the Times helpfully points out the wrong approach, to be read aloud in a southern accent: “One year the turkey took a long time to cook and I went to carve it...

ART: Duke Riley brings his latest exhibit, After the Battle of Brooklyn: East River Incognita II, to Magnan Projects. Starting tonight and showing through December 22nd, the works imagine New York during the Revolutionary War and "interweave historical and contemporary events with elements of fiction and myth to create allegorical histories. His re-imagined narratives comment on a range of issues from the cultural impact of overdevelopment and gentrification of waterfront communities to contradictions within political ideologies as well as commerce and the role of the artist in society and at war."

We all knew the real estate bubble was causing insanity, but we should have known it's encouraged people to divorce. There's a NY Times Styles section article about some who wait until the market's at its peak to divorce - that way, they can benefit from an even bigger profit when selling their homes.

For your daily dose of amusement/ outrage/ disbelief at the city we live in, the NY Times has an article about apartment buildings selling private parking spaces for as much as $225,000. Seriously.

If parking at the Onyx Chelsea, a new 52-unit condo at 28th Street and Eighth Avenue, is any indication, there is plenty of demand. The first two spots sold for $165,000, the third for $175,000 and the last two for $195,000. Each space will include about $50 in monthly maintenance costs. Still, there are three buyers on a waiting list.

Continue reading "NYers Who Are Not Worrying About Congestion Pricing: The Ones Buying Parking Spaces for $225,000"

Whether you're a fan of the reality genre or not, voyeurism has injected itself into every form of entertainment since shows like The Real World gave anyone with cable a chance to see the day-to-day lives of total strangers. With everything from HBO's Voyeur to watching a band in a bubble, we wish this were enough to satiate those creepy peeping tom's out there!

Since the only truly green event is the one that doesn't happen, Live Earth is certainly being met with some criticism - but either way it's going to cast some green over the world tomorrow. If you aren't heading over to the "New York" event yourself, NBC Universal will be bringing the concert to the world with a three-hour primetime special Saturday night on NBC, 18 hours of live coverage on Bravo, seven hours on CNBC and lot more over at the Sundance Channel, Universal HD, Telemundo and Mun2. More on how they prepped for the event, and how they learned from Live 8, here.

If the Manhattan real estate market is still a bubble, then it's a bubble with unbelievable staying power. The Sun reports that second quarter real estate data reveals that the average Manhattan apartment sells for $1.3 million (a record-high according to three of four real estate firms). The median sales price of a Manhattan apartment is another record: $895,000. And the commercial side is also very strong, with foreign buyers opting to buy buildings and apartments with the weak dollar.

READING: Today NY Mag asks, "What does Tina Brown have to do to get some attention?" Well tonight she's signing copies of her new book (a tell-all on Princess Di) called The Diana Chronicles.

As of last night, Pier 54 became a temporary home for the band Cartel. Haven't heard of them? That's probably why they opted for this reality show/publicity stunt thing.

Every show biz impresario knows that the best way to get to Broadway is not by waiting for Guffman but by stirring up a little controversy. Though it seems unlikely that’s what Connecticut high school students intended while developing a play about the Iraq quagmire, controversy is what they got when Principal Skinner Canty cancelled their little performance. After the ensuing uproar, which included public outcries from such heavyweights as Edward Albee and Christopher Durang, two off-Broadway theaters in New York have offered to produce the play, called Voices in Conflict.

Blogging Project Runway doesn't stop just because the show isn't airing right now. They have some reports in from the auditions for Season 4, and also point to a clip at MTV. They took the picture at right of Jason (who also auditioned for Season 3) - with one of his creations that he hopes will get him on the show. Did he make it work? We'd have to see it on that crazy model Amanda from Season 3 to be certain.

April 5: Italian Festa to celebrate the paperback publication of George deStefano's An Offer We Can't Refuse: The Mafia in the Mind of America. A reading and signing, followed by a Sicilian wine tasting, with antipasti served. Free. Hunters Point Wines and Spirits, 47-07 Vernon Boulevard, Long Island City, Queens.

Yesterday, lawyers for Peter Braunstein, the journalist turned molester in a firefighter's costume, said that their client has a fractured skull with a brain hematoma. While they say they are not sure how he got the injury, an assistant district attorney told a judge that a Riker's official said it was "self-inflicted": "...the official said he banged his head on a sink in his cell, possibly in an attempt to delay his trial." Well, Braunstein did try to slash his own throat when authorities caught up with him in Memphis.

THEATER: Theodora Skipitares is a Greek-American playwright, director and puppeteer who uses near life-size puppets and Greek tragedies to look at our current situation in Iraq. (Her rendition of the Iliad and the Odyssey was a sold-out hit at La MaMa last year.) Her new show, which features puppetry and video, is The Exiles, an adaptation of the Orestes/Electra myth. “In this particular story of betrayal and vengeance, these puppets are an eerie construction of facade and public display, while their operators are a shadow of primal, often raw emotions and personal desires.” (Read last month's Times profile of Skipitares here.) - John Del Signore

It's birdseed throwing or bubble blowing time with this weekend's NY Times wedding announcements.

Street artist Highraff recently came to the United States for the first time to raise awareness about the culture of his hometown São Paulo, Brazil, where he’s been painting in the streets since 1997. The twenty-nine-year-old artist, whose given name is Rafael Calazans Pierri, currently has work on display here in New York as part of Ruas de São Paulo: A Survey of Brazilian Street Art at the Jonathan LeVine Gallery. If you think his psychedelic murals are coming off the walls, it’s because he uses MDF material to turn colorful scenes into three-dimensional sculptures. Gothamist caught up with Highraff and asked him what he thinks about the New York graffiti scene.

- Shortly before the now infamous Bourdain post skewering the Food Network appeared, blogger Jinius put her newly acquired TV writing skills to the test with a piece funneling the stars of the much maligned network into the Lost model. Enjoy and don’t miss riding the wake still behind Bourdain’s post, hundreds of comments from readers, Josh at Grub Street defending RR and Nina Lalli piling on him.

Brrrr… An honest to goodness cold day! A low temperature in the single digits! Can you believe it? It's been nearly two years since it has been this cold. To be exact, the last time it was this cold was on January 28th, 2005, toward the end of an eleven day cold snap. Our current cold snap? A pathetic two days.

Texas is thawing, the Northeast is freezing, and a sort of natural order seems almost restored to the Ist-A-Verse. Almost.

Yes, yes, last night was the Golden Globes. And boy, that Warren Beatty NEVER SHUTS UP.

The NY Times bursts the bubble for a lot of New Yorkers who complain about city traffic. While most of us blame out-of-towners for clogging up streets, it turns out that city drivers make up most of the vehicular traffic. The reasons are varied: many people drive from the outer boroughs where subway service is less accessible. Many are government workers who get free parking (think about that one, Mayor Mike, as you PLANYC). Some just prefer cars to the subways or buses.

The family of Matthew Velez, a 17 year old who was fatally beaten while in a juvenile jail at Rikers in 2000, has accepted a $650,000 settlement with the city. Velez was being held there for a minor drug charge, but was attacked by members of the Bloods. Back in 2004, Newsday found that Rikers guards made "major errors...[that] contributed to Velez's beating and his subsequent death.":

Continue reading "City Settles Rikers Death Lawsuit"

29-year-old artist Jacob Thomas has been putting pen to paper since he was a child, planting the seeds for what would become a full-time career. Hailing from Maryland, he did a four-year stint in the Coast Guard, where his creative talents didn't go unnoticed. He was asked to paint interiors of ships and design logos and other artwork for them, which in turn helped spur his own creative impulses. After several years in Pittsburgh, he moved to New York and developed his colorful, modern portraits which have since attracted the attention of major media companies.

Real estate pundits are calling the downturn in the New York residential real estate market, as the NY Sun reports, a "soft landing" versus a "bubble burst." Apparently the fourth quarter was pretty good for some real estate brokers!

Last night, just after 7pm, inside of a giant bubble in midtown, the Paper Nightlife Awards took place. In the world of fake awards ceremonies, this one takes the cake. Sadly, we didn't keep notes on who won what, so we cannot tell you who took home the "Best Designer with an Influence on the Nightlife Scene" award. We do recall La Esquina winning for "Restaurant with the Best Nightlife Scene." The white dude accepting the award snidely thanked "all the Mexicans" in his acceptance speech. Cultural exploitation is so fucking chic.

I could tell there was something fishy going on. Everyone told me to stay away from Junior’s. As far back as Master Cabbie Taxi Academy, my classmate told me that Junior’s wasn’t as good as it used to be. So many of my frequent fares out to Park Slope treated me like I was some sort of stupid Midwestern tourist for even showing interest in Junior’s. And now that Junior’s has opened another location in Times Square, people act like going there would be the equivalent of doing business with Saddam during the embargo.