NYC's Secret Celebrity Hotspot, Turtle
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EASTERN CONSOLIDATED IN THE PRESS AS APPEARED IN BISNOW ON MARCH 20, 2017 Neighborhood Tour: NYC’s Secret Celebrity Hotspot, Turtle Bay Four hundred years ago, Mid- tric posts scattered throughout town East was a tuft of wilder- the neighborhood. ness on the banks of the East River. As is the case for much “Most New Yorkers aren’t even of New York City’s early colonial aware that this beautiful oasis history, Dutch settlers gradual- exists,” said Adelaide Polsinel- ly built the first neighborhoods, li, principal of NYC brokerage snapping up parcels of free land Eastern Consolidated. “It’s a handed out by Peter Stuyvesant sleepy enclave in the city, but along what is now 41st to 53rd steps away from bustling Mid- streets. The Dutch moniker for town.” the knife-shaped bay — deutal in translation — was anglicized Why the perpetual lack of out- to today’s Turtle Bay. side interest, particularly in a neighborhood teeming with a Despite its relative proximity to microcosmic snapshot of ev- Grand Central, NYC landmarks erything the city has to offer? and countless retail and din- Turns out, it was built that way ing options, the former home from the very beginning. of Greta Garbo, Katharine Hepburn, Paul Newman, E.B. Turtle Bay is peppered with White and Kurt Vonnegut has traces of nearly every major remained quietly overlooked phase of American history. Mid- in the heart of Manhattan. The town development flourished neighborhood’s sequestered on the heels of the Civil War, nature has long made it the with middle- and upper-mid- perfect hideaway for celebrities dle-class residents filling up the seeking an escape from prying townhouses springing up along eyes. New York Historical Tours the river. Land values stayed co-founder and historian Kevin low as the waterfront remained Draper even turned a little wist- dominated by slaughterhouses ful upon recalling that his favor- and industrial warehouses. The ite Beatles member, John Len- to shoot movies and television filmed on the higher terraces completion of Grand Central in non, resided here as well. shows with little disturbance, of the Tudor City apartment the 1920s pushed corporate Draper said. The Green Gob- complexes; today, production headquarters — including Pfiz- This insularity renders the district lin balcony sequences in Sam permits for FOX crime drama er and Phillip Morris — into Mid- an ideal location for producers Raimi’s “Spider-Man 2” were Gotham can be found on elec- town, as executives and CEOs WWW.EASTERNCONSOLIDATED.COM I 212.499.7700 EASTERN CONSOLIDATED IN THE PRESS Logo Here living in Westchester chose to While rents in the Tudor City open offices near the station area are fairly moderately priced rather than commute farther — $2,500 to $2,800 for a stu- downtown. dio and $3,000 to $3,500 for a one-bedroom — the winds The answer to these early are shifting. Part of the neigh- years of “flight to the suburbs” borhood’s relative affordability arrived in the form of the most stems from a lack of immediate prominent buildings in the access to a subway stop. district: the Tudor City apart- ments, which began con- The Jan. 1 opening of the struction in the late 1920s and Second Avenue subway’s first concluded in the early 1930s. phase is already raising proper- NYC developer Fred French ty values in the Upper East Side built 15 buildings, crafting a and the East End. Construction city within a city, complete plans for Phase 3 are rolling in with cleaners, a bar, grocer- for the next decade. Once the ies and restaurants to draw in stop opens on the corner of families searching for a quieter 49th Street, unstabilized rents community to raise children. are likely to skyrocket. “It’s a Draper swears by the con- timely opportunity to invest venience of taking his kids here,” Adelaide said. Halloween trick-or-treating in just one apartment building This affordability translates here, in the sort of community into few to no retail vacan- where everyone knows each cies on 2nd and 3rd ave- other to this day. nues, with most spots filled with mom-and-pops. The Windows were constructed al- blocks are flecked with locally most exclusively facing inward, owned wine stores, cleaners, away from the sight and smell shoe repair, pizza shops and of the slaughterhouses that boutiques servicing an imme- would meet their demise when diate community defined by John D. Rockefeller Jr. bought Behind these townhouses, in- city’s largest private garden. strong pedestrian traffic. The up the land and donated it for dividual gardens merging into It is inspired by the very same survival of favorite eateries the construction of the UN larger community gardens be- one planted in 1919 by social- such as P.J. Clarke’s, Drap- headquarters at 46th Street came the norm. ite Charlotte Sorchan — behind er said, were part of a bid by and First Avenue. Today, own- every single brownstone on the Turtle Bay Association ers are slowly knocking out Take Adelaide’s exclusive list- East 49th — and tended over to keep the character of the new windows for future outer ing property at 220 East 49th the years by the celebrity writ- block and prevent high-rises tenants to share a stunning St. Priced at $10M and featur- ers and Hollywood stars who from blocking sunlight to the river view with NYU campus ing 10 separate apartments, would later inhabit the neigh- aforementioned community buildings a few blocks over. the building sits in front of the borhood. gardens. WWW.EASTERNCONSOLIDATED.COM I 212.499.7700 EASTERN CONSOLIDATED IN THE PRESS Logo Here “It’s a classic story of the own- structured to accommodate Blockhead and The Smith. infamous skirt-blowing pose ers not wanting to sell out, single-family-owner resi- from “The Seven-Year Itch.” standing their ground,” Draper dences above ground-floor The property sits between said. “And to this day, the busi- retail. One such quiet edifice a bakery and apartment “Who says retail’s dead?” Ad- ness is still around and thriving is at 313 East 53rd St., which building just blocks from the elaide said. “It’s alive and thriv- as a holdout.” Polsinelli just placed on the grate on Lexington and 53rd ing. It just has to be in the right market, spilling into the bus- where Warner Brothers pho- area, in the right space, with Many of these buildings are tle of local saloons such as tographed Marilyn Monroe’s the right rent.” WWW.EASTERNCONSOLIDATED.COM I 212.499.7700.