Does the weather have you down? Harken back to warmer months and slurp down some oysters. The only thing that tastes better is when those oysters cost $1 and you can wash them down with some happy-hour-priced drinks! Mermaid Oyster Bar/Inn: My favorite! If you can't make it out to their nightly (5-7PM Tuesday-Friday, 4-7PM Saturday Sunday) happy hour, stop by Monday night when every hour is happy hour. In addition to $1 oysters, you can get special appetizers and great drinks for cheap. If you check in on Yelp, you can get a free side as well. Sel Rrose: This Lower East Side bar has a great atmosphere and several varieties of oyster to choose from -- all for a $1 apiece. In my experience, it's never too crowded after work, so a fantastic option if you are downtown. Finally, Ten Bells, where you can enjoy your $1.25 oysters with a great selections of wines and Spanish tapas. It also happens to be next door to my favorite Mexican restaurant, Barrio Chino. For more options, check out Time Out NY's great list of happy hour oysters here. #NYCHappenings #BlogPosts

Growing up in Friday-Night-Lights, Texas, I followed football pretty closely growing up and through college. Since then, my interest has waned, and now, I "watch" football (meaning I am present in a room where the TV is showing a football game) for about 13 minutes total per football season. With that caveat -- that I am not exactly a die-hard football fan -- I still love live football for its atmosphere and all that the experience entails. For starters, football season starts during the most glorious season when temperatures are mild and the leaves are turning. Add to that, dressing in layers, some cozy blankets, and perhaps some tailgating, and you get a fantastic experience that requires no knowledge of the rules of the game or players. NFL games showcase the pinnacle of the game, but for my purposes I like college football set in a beautiful campus painted in Fall's gorgeous colors. Each year, I head up to Yale to watch a game there, but this year I have been dying to also make a trip up to Westpoint which has amazing views and the pomp of a parade. Are you planning to catch a game this Fall? #NYCHappenings #BlogPosts

1071 Fifth Avenue (at 89th Street) Just as notable as the masterpieces contained within, the Guggenheim Museum itself is an architectural landmark worthy of a special trip. The building was built to house the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation's collection, amassed and displayed under the direction of artist Hilla von Rebay, who asked Frank Lloyd Wright, to design a "temple of spirit." Completed in 1959, the cylindrical building, wider at the top than the bottom, features a unique ramp gallery extends up from ground level in a long, continuous spiral along the outer edges of the building to end just under the ceiling skylight. The building's surface was made out of concrete to reduce the cost, inferior to the red-colored stone finish that Wright had wanted. The building underwent extensive expansion and renovations in 1992 (when an adjoining tower was built) and from 2005 to 2008. While now considered revolutionary -- in a good way -- the design polarized architecture critics before it was even built. Some believed that the building would overshadow the museum's artworks. Wright argued to the contrary that the design makes "the building and the painting an uninterrupted, beautiful symphony such as never existed in the World of Art before." Other critics, and many artists, felt that it is awkward to properly hang paintings in the shallow, windowless, concave exhibition niches that surround the central spiral. Currently on exhibition is pre-abstraction Kandinsky and a tribute to the Frank Lloyd Wright. As always, you can check out the museum's extensive permanent collection with works by Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, Edouard Manet, Claude Monet, Pablo Picasso, Camille Pissarro, Pierre Auguste Renoir, and Vincent van Gogh. #NotableinNY #BlogPosts

One Hanson Place The Williamsburgh Savings Bank Tower, in Fort Greene, is a Brooklyn icon and was the tallest building in the borough until the Brooklyner came around in 2010. This is the first appearance of a Brooklyn building in this column, and I selected this One Hanson Place because I can't help but be awed by its reflective facade every day when I look out my windows at sunset. The four-sided clocktower was built in 1929 to house the headquarters of the Williamsburgh Savings Bank. The building is in the Byzantine-Romanesque style and featured (to the chagrin of its architects) a Renaissance-style dome. In 2007, the landmark was converted into luxury condominiums. Its grandiose entry hall -- the Skylight event space -- houses the Brooklyn Flea in winter months. #NotableinNY #BlogPosts

233 Broadway (between Park Place and Barclay) The Woolworth Building was designed by architect Cass Gilbert in the neo-Gothic style to house the F.W. Woolworth Company's corporate headquarters. At the time of its completion in 1913, the 792-foot building was the tallest in the world and boasted 60 stories and over 5,000 windows. The Woolworth Company began as a single 5-cent store in 1879. The concept expanded to include 10-cent merchandise, and the first "five-and-dime" store grew into 586 stores nationwide. By the late 20th century, most of Woolworth's discount stores were gone: rebranded, shut down, or sold to Walmart. Since 2001, the Woolworth empire is largely limited to its top-performing retailer -- Foot Locker. F.W. Woolworth's granddaughter, socialite/heiress Barbara Hutton (the "Poor Little Rich Girl"), brought notoriety to the Woolworth family through her lavish yet very troubled life. The building has housed numerous tenants through the years: corporate offices for many retailers, Columbia Records, Fordham and NYU education facilities, a federal probation office. Most recently, developer Alchemy Properties began converting the top 30 floors of the building into 34 condominiums. This month preliminary pricing on the nine-story penthouse was revealed to be a whopping $110 million! #NotableinNY #BlogPosts

The Second Quarter Corcoran Reports for Manhattan and Brooklyn are in! Here are a few of the key findings for Manhattan: Inventory Starting to Turn Around. Although the number of properties listed for sale remains very low (52% below the peak in Q1 2009), we are starting to see more of them. Inventory rose for the second quarter in a row. Limited Supply Buoys Prices. The continuing depressed level of available property kept the market competitive for buyers. Slower Activity in Bread-and-Butter Sales. In Manhattan, one- and two-bedroom units are the primary drivers of residential sales activity, but they are occurring with decreasing frequency. (see Sales by Price Category, p. 6.) Luxury Sales Take a Larger Share. Activity at the high end continued to be robust, and grew as an overall percentage of the market. Properties above $3M now account for 12% of sales (up 3% from a year ago), and 26% of available inventory (up 4%). Price Per Square Foot Sets New Record. The focus on high-end sales drove the average price per square foot for Manhattan real estate up to $1,286. And meanwhile in Brooklyn: • Slowing sales. For the third consecutive quarter, there were fewer sales than the prior quarter. • Rising prices. Tight inventory levels kept the market competitive and caused prices to reach their highest point since the downturn of 2008. The price per square foot in Brooklyn is now $760. • Condos, luxury property lead the market. A strong appetite for condominiums, townhouses, and high-end property fueled market activity; there were more closings over $2M in Q2 14 than in any prior quarter. Feel free to contact me with your questions about the Corcoran Report and the Manhattan residential real estate market. #NYCMarketAnalysesTips #BlogPosts

1 West 72nd Street (at Central Park West) Now considered one of Manhattan’s most prestigious coop buildings with a prime Upper West Side address, when it was built in 1884, the Dakota was in such a desolate location that it might as well have been in… well… the Dakotas. The high-gabled building with dormers, balconies, niches, and balustrades was designed by Henry J. Hardenbergh architect of the Plaza Hotel, for Edward Clark, head of the Singer Sewing Machine Company. The Dakota was one of the pioneering high rises in the Upper West Side which was largely undeveloped throughout the nineteenth century. With the relocation of Columbia University from the East Side to Morningside Heights, a wave of intellectuals, artists, and immigrants began moving into the area. Unlike the Upper East Side, which has always been associated with wealth and prestige, the Upper West Side retains its reputation for being more bohemian despite the surge in housing prices and influx of celebrities into the area in recent decades. Many UWS celebrities resided in the Dakota, including John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Lauren Bacall, Roberta Flack, Joe Namath, Judy Garland, and Maury Povich and Connie Chung. Notably, it has not been home to Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas, Billy Joel, Carly Simon, and Gene Simmons all of whom were rejected by its iron-clad board. The Dakota has become a star in its own right. Many may recognize the building as “The Bramford” from Roman Polanski’s chilling 1968 film Rosemary’s Baby. Tom Cruise’s character lived there in Vanilla Sky. It is the setting of numerous novels and boasts its own documentary, Dreaming of the Dakota (2013). #NotableinNY #BlogPosts

I've known a Phillips-head screwdriver from a flathead since I've known language. My dad was always repairing or building something, and since no one else was interested in helping him, I was always his assistant. As a 4-year old, I helped him fix up an old Volkswagon that was found at the bottom of a lake. Later, we built a Barbie Dreamhouse (to my architectural drawings, of course) and a shed in the backyard for all of his tools. Add to that the sundry repairs around the house, and I considered myself an expert by the time I left for college. Living in an apartment in New York, I dream of owning more power tools someday. But having only a drill, jig saw, hand sander, staple/nail gun, and other hand tools, hasn't stopped me from tackling home improvement projects time and time again. These projects don't always turn out perfectly, and they cause a giant mess in the process (usually in the living room), but I find it deeply satisfying to build or fix something that becomes an integral part of my home. In the last year, I built and upholstered a tufted headboard, converted a full-size wooden bed frame to a queen-size, refinished a dresser and a buffet, built a "faux-denza" from Ikea kitchen cabinets and a wooden frame, dyed a rug, and fitted shoe shelves into a narrow hall closet. Some of these projects look a bit more "hand-made" than others -- e.g., the refinished items need some additional finishing and some of the tufts are more tufted than others -- but I'm proud of them. If you're thinking about a home-improvement or DIY project, I'd love to hear from you. I may have already attempted it or it may be the next thing on my list! #DIYDecor #BlogPosts

2109 Broadway (at West 73rd) The Ansonia seemed destined for notoriety from its very inception. The grand building was dreamed up by William Earl Dodge Stokes, a real estate developer and heir to a copper fortune. Stokes made waves when, at 42, he married Rita Hernandez de Alba de Acosta, the pampered 15-year old daughter of a Spanish heiress and a Cuban poet. The marriage was far from blissful and broke up in 1899, the same year Stokes broke ground on the Ansonia. Stokes kept Weddie, their only child, in exchange for the largest divorce settlement to date. Stokes as "architect-in-chief" commissioned Paul DuBoy, a sculptor, to build the grandest hotel in New York. The resulting 550,000 square feet structure was in the Beaux Arts style with a mansard roof and round corner turets. It featured a grand ballroom, restaurants, tea rooms, barbershop, a bank, Turkish baths and a lobby fountain with live seals, and included a rooftop farm to realize Stokes' utopian vision for a self-sufficient residential hotel. After Stokes' death in 1926, the suites were subdivided into smaller rental units, and the Ansonia fell into disrepair. After several failed attempts to demolish the building in the 1960s, the Ansonia was landmarked in 1972. In 1992, the Ansonia came full circle to its former grandeur when it was restored and converted to condos, with many of the smaller apartments re-combined to provide luxury living. The Ansonia has always been linked with colorful characters and scandal. One of its first residents, Al Adams, a notorious convicted racketeer, was found in his room with a gun shot wound that was ruled a suicide amidst speculation that Stokes had murdered him over gambling debts. For you baseball fans, many New York Yankees have lived in the Ansonia, including Babe Ruth who would wander through the halls in his scarlet robe and practice his saxophone in his suite. A few years earlier, notorious White Sox first baseman Chick Gandil, another resident, held meetings in the Ansonia to try to recruit his teammates to throw the 1919 World Series. Musicians and entertainers also flocked to the Ansonia. Broadway legend Florenz Ziegfeld and his wife (and his mistress in a separate suite) called it home, as did several of the Metropolitan Opera's general managers and great tenors. In 1968, the Continental Baths, a gay bathhouse and nightclub, was opened in the basement. Bette Midler's stage persona -- the Divine Miss M -- was created in the Baths where she performed with Barry Manilow. The Baths closed in 1974, and three years later a straight swinger's club, Plato's Retreat, took its place until 1980. #NotableinNY #BlogPosts

I love to read but I hate picking what to read next. When a new book by one of my favorite authors comes out, it's a no-brainer that I will devour it, usually within a day or two. Then I'm back to square one. What next? While there are ranking lists based popularity and critical response, I usually don't find that these align with my tastes. I have taken to social media for guidance from people I know. This method works for me as it doesn't limit the question to recent publications and it allows me to ask additional questions of the recommender to figure out if I will also like the book. Most recently, a friend recommended "The Sound of Things Falling" which was an excellent book and one I most certainly would not have found on my own. How do you select your next book? Do you have any recommendations for me? #DIYDecor #BlogPosts

While New York is packed with world-famous, must-see museums (the Met, Natural History Museum, MOMA, Guggenheim, to name a few), this month I am featuring two museums which I have yet to explore but intend to in the next month. The Tenement Museum in the Lower East Side is unparalleled for the education it provides of New York City's history. There are many tours offered by the museum which immerse the tour-goer in the experiences of various urban, immigrant working class people. On Thursday evenings, the museum offers Tastings at the Tenement, a multi-course meal featuring the flavors of the Lower East Side which are heavily influenced by the multicultural history of the neighborhood. The Whitney Museum is celebrating its biennial this year with "one of the broadest and most diverse takes on art in the United States." This exhibition will be curated by three different outside curators, and it will be the last opportunity to visit the museum in its current home on Madison Avenue before it moves downtown in the Spring of 2015. There are so many other exciting museums and exhibitions going on right now. Which ones do you plan to visit? #NYCHappenings #BlogPosts

175 Fifth Avenue (at 23rd Street) One of the most iconic buildings in NYC, the Flatiron Building is not the first triangular building, but it is the largest and most-recognizable of its kind. In the late 1800s, the lot on which the Flatiron Building now stands was used as a sort of Times Square Marquee. The lot's owner built a sign made out of electric lights and installed a canvas screen and projector, attracting visitors to Madison Square Park to view advertisements, pictures, and news bulletins. After the owner’s death, the lot changed hands several times, eventually ending up under the ownership of Harry S. Black, CEO of the Fuller Company, a general contractor specializing in the building of skyscrapers. Black retained Chicago’s Daniel Burnham to design the company’s new headquarters on the spot. Despite his efforts, the moniker Fuller Building never caught on as locals persisted in calling the new triangular skyscraper the Flatiron Building, so-named so for its resemblance to a cast-iron clothes iron. Completed in 1902, the architecture of the Flatiron Building espouses the Chicago school of design and thus differs from its contemporaries in New York. Built over a steel frame, its façade was inspired by a Greek pillar with ornate scrolling and an ornamented base and top. The pointed end of the structure is a 25 degree angle creating what some critics dubbed “a stingy piece of pie.” The building remains a functioning office building, with these “point” offices being the most coveted among the tenants. While some hated its unusual design, the Flatiron Building came to symbolize New York and became a pop culture darling. Among its many appearances, the Flatiron Building is the headquarters for the Daily Bugle in the Spiderman movies, it is the workplace of April O’Neil in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoons, and it was accidentally destroyed by the US Navy in the 1998 film Godzilla. It is also considered one of the most-photographed buildings in the world – through the lens of artists (such as Alfred Steiglitz and Edward Steichen) and countless tourists each day. #NotableinNY #BlogPosts