parish polity

Not realising that the historic church at the intersection of Wall Street and Broadway had such an extensive real estate endowment and remains one of the chief property-holders in Manhattan with a significant acreage and Hudson Square in its portfolio, we really enjoyed reading this well-researched article on New York City’s Trinity Church.
Originally Dutch-held farm land of New Amsterdam, the area was conferred to the English Crown in 1671 and chartered by Queen Anne in 1705 as a royal grant for the establishment of an Anglican church for the Episcopal Diocese. Though more enlightened and civic-minded presently, the church once had the reputation of a predatory slumlord and an engine of gentrification—with the later still being a perennial source of contention. When Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip visited in 1976, the vestrymen of the church paid off nearly three hundred years of rent in arrears in peppercorns.

departures and arrivals lounge

As Curbed reports, the restored 1962 Eero Saarinen’s iconic TWA Flight Centre—originally designed as the terminal for the Trans World Airline’s hub at the John F Kennedy International Airport of New York City—the “Grand Central Station of the Jet Age” to be revitalised under protective status (not all were so decorously spared) as a historic landmark (Saarinen also designed the Gateway Arch of Saint Louis, Missouri) as a conference space and hotel that reference the Mid-Century Modern trappings of its inception is, construction work continuing a pace since 2016, already accepting bookings for a projected opening date early next year. Check out more photographs of the interiors with retro furnishings, skyboxes and other amenities at the link up top.

gotham

The marvellous property-scout Nag on the Lake invites us to a rather breath-taking viewing of a unique bell-tower penthouse on Centre Street of Manhattan—where for price, the happy new tenants could enjoy panoramic views from the cupola of New York City. The Beaux Arts style building was built to purpose as the New York City Police Headquarters and served this role from 1909 to the early 1970s when the department outgrew its operations centre. In the late 1980s, the structure at the heart of the metropolis was converted into posh condominiums. This would be a pretty swank hideout for a brooding and mysterious superhero.