Standing at just under 2 feet tall on a "tower" display stand, and containing around 800 pages -- there's a new book in town! And it's not going to fit in many people's apartments. The pages contain 1200 photographs that capture the city, including shots from Henri Cartier-Bresson and Annie Leibowitz. As an accompaniment to the visuals there's written word provided by folks like EB White, John Updike and Tom Wolfe. While there's no price......

This week, reports the Downtown Express, the Landmarks Preservation Commission recommended that architects incorporate elements of the Battery Maritime Building's original architecture into a proposed plan to renovate and expand the ferry terminal. The Dermot Company seeks to develop a glass boutique hotel (complete with roof lounge) and specialty foods marketplace above the Beaux Arts ferry terminal. The changes at the Battery Maritime Building gives us an inside look at the politics of historic preservation,......

The NY Times takes a careful, detailed look at the rising Museum of Arts and Design building at 2 Columbus Circle more than two years after preservationists failed to stop plans to radically alter the 1964 Edward Durell Stone building. Yale School of Architecture dean Robert AM Stern was one of the better-known critics (after novelist Tom Wolfe, of course), arguing that the original structure was an important Modernist landmark. The fight helped paved the......

FILM: A tribute to Jean Genet on film begins tonight at BAM. The focus will be on films inspired by the French writer, as well as Genet's own Un Chant D'Amour. BAM describes the festival further: A writer, criminal, homosexual, activist, and self-styled renegade, Jean Genet creates incendiary work that offers dreamlike evocations of moral ambiguity in a repressed society, and is rife with homosexuality, outlandish fantasies of submission, and acts of violence. This series......

The City Council unanimously reappointed four commissioners and appointed a new one to the Landmarks Preservation Commission yesterday (via the NY Observer). Four of the five have ties to the outer boroughs. The newest, Diana Chapin, is the Executive Director of the Queens Library Foundation and a founding member of the Historic House Trust, which protects and preserves historic houses. She has served in various positions in the City Parks Department and was the Queens......

Last fall, preservationists failed to prevent the planned demolition of the Dakota Stables on West 77th And Amsterdam Avenue. Though preservationists were trying to have the Dakota Stables landmarked, the Landmarks Preservation Committee denied it landmark status because some of its facade was stripped by the developer - while it was being considered for landmark status! Talk about gaming the system. Now the City Council is reviewing a bill to close a the "landmarks loophole".......

Ah, we knew the NY Times graphics department would come up with something fun after the NY Sun broke news that the posh Upper East 10021 zip code would be assigned to only some residents while others would get new zip codes 10065 and 10075. Anyway, the Times think the biggest winners will be stationers, as future 10065 and 10076 residents trying to play it cool: Tom Wolfe said he will "try to take......

The Landmarks Preservation Commission yesterday stalled Aby Rosen and Norman Foster’s proposed glass tower above the 1949 Parke-Bernet building at 980 Madison Avenue. While the commission didn’t formally reject the plan, it did not approve the addition or support a zoning waiver, two requirements for the project to proceed. All but one commissioner said during the public meeting at the Surrogate’s Court building that they could not support the building because of its scale, massing,......

+ The Landmarks Preservation Commission has been doing its job, but what about the buildings and districts behind the numbers? Meanwhile, 980 Madison developer Aby Rosen says Tom Wolfe “should stick to writing books.” + Speaking of the Commission, it has stripped landmark status from land where a deteriorated 1871 building once stood. That's only happened twice before. + For developers, sluggish condo sales mean only one thing: more upscale hotels, natch. + The......

The Citizens Emergency Committee to Preserve Preservation hauled Mayor Bloomberg to New York State Supreme Court today for failing to reappoint or replace eight of eleven commissioners to the Landmarks Preservation Commission. The commissioners’ terms have expired, which, the Committee alleges, violates the Administrative Code and the City Charter. The Writ of Mandamus seeks to force Mayor Bloomberg to reappoint or replace commissioners whose terms have lapsed. “Mayor Bloomberg has failed to honor is own......

Terrifying: the entire lawn at Cadman Plaza has been astroturfed! [Via Brownstoner.] Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a bank robbery in Staten Island, a suicidal member of service on the George Washington Bridge, and a perp search down by the Manhattan Bridge. Foreign tourists are bum-rushing New York because of the weak dollar: "For example, the Microsoft Zune player - a rival to Apple's iPod - sells for $442 in London but can be......

Yesterday, there was a sprawling editorial (literally sprawling too - it covered two pages) in the NY Times Week in Review by Tom Wolfe. And in it, he ripped the Landmarks Preservation Commission, most of its commissioners, and Mayors Koch, Giuliani and Bloomberg a couple new ones. The essay, The (Naked) City and the Undead, begins with the debate over 980 Madison Avenue and developer Aby Rosen's proposed Norman Foster addition to it. (Which......

With four weeks until the fifth anniversary of September 11, lots of magazines are rolling out their "September 11 think pieces." And New York devotes their cover feature to "What If 9/11 Never Happened?," with essays from a wide variety of people - Andrew Sullivan gives a faux blog, Slate's Supreme Court correspondent Dahlia Lithwick has a scary view of what the law would be like, writer Tom Wolfe (who suggests the same), deputy mayor......

It's not too late to change your plans for tonight and head to either of the evening' stellar literary offerings, is it? Better yet, if you don't have any, consider this: KGB Bar (84 E 4th St) is hosting a reading of non-fiction that should kick off Black History Month with style - Elizabeth Gardner Hines, Rebecca Carroll, Kathy Y. Wilson, and G. Bell. Then, heading uptown to the 92nd St. Y (Lexington Ave. and......

Kate Wood, executive director, LANDMARK WEST!...

Tickets for Robert Deniro’s lovechild have gone on sale, offering over 150 films, documentaries, a free movie “drive in”, and an outside street fair. While movies range from the highly praised and much hyped Mad Hot Ballroom, be aware that acclaimed home video actress Paris Hilton’s horror opus House of Wax will also debut. So please, don’t drink and buy tickets. Highlights include: Tribeca Talks Panel Series: • The Interpreter – A Conversation with......