Lost City visits one of the odder buildings in the East Village today, located at 62 E. 4th Street. Currently two of the five floors house the Duo Theater, but the top three levels have gone unused for nearly 40 years. Built in 1889, the current crumbling facade isn't the biggest mystery -- the architecture is. LC notes:There's all sort of Italianate grandeur in the shapes and lines. But it's all thrown off by the......

Photo by davidfg's flickr. On January 20th, residents of 475 Kent in Williamsburg were evicted from their apartments, which were deemed illegal, after the Fire and Buildings Departments found multiple violations (including a matzo factory housed in the building). Some of the evictees weren't going down without a fight, however, and have kept the incident in the public eye through everything from art shows to simply fighting the good fight. And while they spent......

The number of residential construction permits issued by the Dept. of Buildings in the first quarter of 2008 declined by 46% from the same period in 2007, indicating that the construction boom that has gripped the city over the last several years may be coming to an end. The decline was citywide, with fewer permits issued in all five boroughs, although the sharpest decrease occurred in the Bronx. Developers told Crain's New York Business that......

With Patricia Lancaster's resignation as Buildings Commissioner after a series of high-profile construction-related fatalities and department snafus, the reaction is one of relief from some politicians while developers are sad. Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, who has been unhappy with the DOB for a while, said, "The time had come for new leadership at this department," and City Council member Jessica Lappin said, "I think it was appropriate and necessary...I want to thank her for......

Brownstoner has done the math and concluded that there are a ridiculous number of hotels going up near Brooklyn’s lovely Gowanus Canal. The latest new development will be a nine story Fairfield Inn on Third Avenue between Douglass and Butler streets; construction will begin once existing buildings are torn down. So that makes a future grand total of 7 hotels in the Gowanus neighborhood; three already built and four more on the way. With a......

For those who can't decide between the suburban and the urban lifestyle, there's a simple solution: build a vinyl-sided house on the top of an old Brooklyn apartment building (which is way better than a trailer on Willoughby Avenue). This gem has been around for a while and is just East of Bedford on the southside of Williamsburg. While its residents most likely enjoy unobstructed city views from their rooftop abode, according to a Google......

A rendering for a building that will replace a Cooper Union engineering building has emerged (above). Designed by Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki, the 440,000-square-foot mixed-use building will replace the brown tribute to banality that currently hunkers across from the historic 1859 Cooper Union Foundation building. The 51 Astor Place building is to be demolished; the fate of the connected Starbucks (between Third and Fouth Avenues) is uncertain. The Observer says the proposed building “will......

When the weather outside is frightful, the risks are likely predictable--in high-wind weather anyway. Early yesterday evening, witnesses report that wooden planks broke free from a crane and crashed onto Spring St. at the new Trump SoHo building, reportedly crashing atop several cars. A collapse of steel from a crane at the WTC site early last week crushed a construction trailer where an architect was seriously injured when pieces of steel demolished his workspace after......

How windy is it today? So windy that windows are popping out of the rather new New York Times building at West 41st Street and 8th Avenue. What's the over-under on windows falling out of other new construction? The wind advisory is in effect until 7AM tomorrow. The Department of Buildings has asked "property owners, builders and contractors to secure all materials that could come loose due to the high winds, such as scaffolding......