The Times has a review of Dana Thomas’ new book on the commoditization of luxury brands and the dilution of the meaning of the word itself. From Deluxe: How Luxury Lost its Luster:
In order to make luxury “accessible,” tycoons have stripped away all that has made it special.
Sounds a lot like the condominium market, no?
City Limits’ recent article on the use of affordable housing as a wedge to gain acceptance for large development projects has one or two interesting tidbits on the Quadriad project. When last we heard from Quadriad, Community Board 1 had voted down a committee recommendation to support the Quadriad project and others like it throughout the neighborhood (but not before Quadriad withdrew its proposal to the Board). Quadriad is now saying that they withdrew the proposal to make changes (not really true), and that they will return to the Board with a new proposal next month (probably true – they return to the Board almost every other month with a new proposal).
We told you there’d be a sequel.
When the Daily News reported that Dumbo’s Pearl Street Plaza was being transformed from a parking lot to a public plaza, it was hardly an exclusive. But now, the News’ Rachel Monahan is reporting that DOT plans for three more hardscape plazas on parking lots – and that is news. One of those would be at the Williamsburg Bus Depot – a vast and impenetrable wasteland.
via The Brooklyn Paper, a rundown on lobster rolls in Brooklyn. The best bargain is in Red Hook, though our own Surf Bar comes in mighty affordable.
The Community Preservation Corporation (co-developer of Domino) is funding a moderate-income project on Lawton Street in Bushwick. A good thing, even if moderate-income housing is probably out of reach to more than half the local population.
Happy Birthday to Greenpoint’s own Mae West. (I didn’t know that she was a Doelger.)
Facade easements are (still) perfectly legal, and are still a perfectly legitimate preservation tool. Basically, ceding control of your facade to a charitable entity, you get to write off a charitable deduction equal to the value of your facade (which can be over 10% of the total value of your property).
The lessons to be learned from this article are a) make your easement donation to a bona fide charitable organization (not a charitable organization whose sole reason for being is to accept facade easements and make their employees money in the process); b) make sure that your appraisal is somewhat reality based; and c) get legal advice (preferably not from the charitable organization touting the facade easements in the first place).
Today we learn from Brownstoner that Sun Sun Corp. is bringing “condos and stores and stuff” to Ainslie and Keap. We’re pretty good on condos, thanks, but could definitely use more stuff. Oh, and some contextual zoning too.
Department of Buildings is apparently cracking down on some kinds of construction abuse in the neighborhood, but not all. According to an article in today’s Post, the stepped-up DOB oversight concerns sitework and excavation only, which is great, but only goes so far. It certainly does not cover all of the other bad construction practices in the neighborhood, like unsafe construction sites and illegal work on the weekends. But its a start.
Gowanus Lounge has lots of coverage of Duke Riley’s Red Hook submarine. Breached security zones aside, its a brilliant piece of work (it must be brilliant if its offended the sensibilities of the
But the Post did get the money quote of the whole misadventure:
After speaking with a reporter briefly, Bushnell said, “I’m super-drunk so I want to stop talking.”
And KeyLime Steve has a great set of photos up on the sub’s maiden voyage (assisted by my friend Tom P.).
