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A lot of billionaires might pay a hefty premium for the penthouse located in the tallest mostly residential building in the world. But at New York’s Central Park Tower, which holds that title at 1,550 feet tall, all the building’s residents and their guests will soon have the opportunity to enjoy a slice of the high life via a private club on the 100th floor, which sits at an elevation of about 1,000 feet.
The 57th Street Billionaire’s Row building bucks the trend of having amenities clustered on lower levels of a residential building, but developer Gary Barnett of Extell Development told The Wall Street Journal he wanted all residents of the building to have access to the tower’s best views, which include the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn and New Jersey, in addition to Manhattan. He also added that he thought such access could add substantial value to all the building’s apartments.
In addition to the top floor private club, the building’s other amenities feature indoor and outdoor pools, a movie theater and a sizable outdoor deck on the tower’s 14th and 16th floors.
“We sacrificed a percentage of the building to do something really special,” Barnett told The Journal.
The 179-unit building launched sales in October 2018 and a few residents have already moved in. Units range in price from about $8 million to $150 million, but some of the priciest units haven’t even listed yet. Sales have picked up over the course of about the last year-and-a-half, despite a slow first couple of years, Barnett said, and now they’ve brought in $1 billion in closed sales and contract signings.
The priciest deal thus far was a four-bedroom, 8,000-square-foot apartment on the 53rd floor that sold for about $50.02 million in September.
Lauren Rottet of Rottet Studio designed the club, which includes a bar and dining room, a ballroom and a cigar lounge.
One of the tower’s pools | Credit: Street Easy
The bar and dining room
The private restaurant is headed by Michelin-starred chefs Laurent Tourondel, Gabriel Kreuther and Alfred Portale, who created a menu that is “Mediterranean, with subtle French and Italian undertones,” the building’s lifestyle curator Colin Cowie said.
The space includes the most high-end finishes, like bookmatched burl wood paneling and custom-lacquered walnut tables with brass inlay. A custom Rubelli fabric lines the ceiling, while bronze and glass floating shelves behind the bar compliment the polished Portoro Nero Italian marble bartop.
The ballroom
An elegant ballroom can host up to 150 people for private parties or weddings. The decadence continues in this room where a custom rug produced by rug and carpet manufacturer ICE International that’s made of wool and silk cost a hefty $100,000.
A couple of blue velvet upholstered sofas by designer Holly Hunt that adorn the room run at $35,000 for two, while gold-leaf accents along a coffered ceiling add another element of glamor.
Central Park Tower’s Bar | Credit: Street Easy
The cigar lounge
Rottet created the cigar lounge so that it might resemble a cigar box itself. “I wanted you to feel like you’re inside the humidor,” she told The Journal. A specially engineered ventilation system reduces smoke in the lounge.
An elegant floor made of Wenge wood with an oak inset includes a custom parquet detail. The luxury continues with a poker table finished in dark ebony. Looking up through an exhale of smoke, visitors to the lounge will see a ceiling of leather paneling with brass detail. Residents who visit the lounge have the option to store their own bottles in individually locked cabinets made from straight-grain walnut.
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