Rande Gerber and wife
Cindy Crawford |
TIME
WARNER CENTER
The
Colossus On Columbus
Dazzles With Vertical Shopping
Story by Edward T. Callaghan
Photos: Rob Rich
 ORGET
the schlep to Manhasset, duck the tolls to Woodbury Commons and
cash in the tix to Vegas to hit the Forum Shops.
The Big Apple can now boast its very own mall with a
decided New York twist: the opulent Time Warner Center on Columbus
Circle.
Opening night had all the
air of the Academy Awards complete with red carpet and limo
gridlock that choked Central Park South and West.
Thousands of New York’s movers and shakers, high rollers,
celebs and wannabes swarmed over slick marble floors to get their
first look at the latest big $$$ shot to New York’s economy.
For such glittering folks
as Ahmet and Mica Ertegun, Gov. George Pataki,
Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Kevin Bacon, Danny Aiello, Jerry
Della Femina and wife Judy Licht, Loews
co-chairman Preston Tisch, Famke Janssen, Elizabeth Berkley and
Fern Mallis, the lure was the roster of luxury product
purveyors and 5-star chefs who have taken up residence in the
80-story twin tower structure.
NBC newscaster Felicia Taylor
and Jack Lynch |
Thomas Keller, Gray
Junz, Masa Takayama, Charlie Trotter
and Jean George Vongerichten are some of culinary world’s headliners who’ll be dishing up their
specialties to the well-heeled around the clock.
Coach, Cole-Haan, Armani,
Bose, Thomas Pink, Godiva, Tourneau and Hugo Boss are just
a sample of the high-end retailers who are gambling that New
Yorkers aren’t vertically challenged and will do their
windowshopping via escalators from floor to floor.
And opening night they
did just that – gliding up and down waving to friends and
careful not to get their Manolo Blahniks caught.
Cindy Crawford
with plenty of experience in that area shuttled friends up to the
fourth floor to hubby Rande Gerber’s latest addition to
his nightlife empire, Stone Rose.
Time Warner chairman Richard
Parsons was beaming like a proud papa to CNN top talents Paula
Zahn, Wolf Blitzer and Larry King who trekked
north for a looky-loo. The Daily Show anchor Jon Stewart was
momentarily speechless but quickly returned to his customary
quipping as MC.
Just to add a little more
juice to the gala evening, pop star Jewel and crooner and
hometown boy Marc Anthony a took to the stage.
As did, the always mesmerizing Cirque de Soleil
troupe and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra which now calls
the complex home.
Cirque
de Soleil |
Designed by David
Childs of Skidmore Owings and Merrill, the $1.7 billion
complex stands on the former site of the New York Coliseum, which
for the last two decades had been a seedy reminder of better days
the Circle once enjoyed. We
remember with great fondness a visit to the British Exposition
some 40 years ago when the Coliseum was in its glory.
Now the twin 80-story
edifice, with a super deluxe Mandarin Oriental Hotel, sky-
high priced condos (up to $45 million and that’s without the
curtains!) and the largest supermarket in New York City, Whole
Foods (the star attraction in our book), sparkle over the treetops
of Central Park.
Gov. Pataki may very well
be right: “This will attract people not just from New York but
from around the world.” We
bet it will! |
