The Sky's the Limit

Passion and Property in Manhattan

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By Steven Gaines

Read by Steven Gaines

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This item is a preorder. Your payment method will be charged immediately, and the product is expected to ship on or around August 1, 2005. This date is subject to change due to shipping delays beyond our control.

With his signature elan, Gaines weaves a gossipy tapestry of brokers, buyers, co-op boards, and eccentric landlords and tells of the apartment hunting and renovating adventures of many celebrities — from Tommy Hilfiger to Donna Karan, from Jerry Seinfeld to Steven Spielberg, from Barbra Streisand to Madonna.

Gaines uncovers the secretive, unwritten rules of co-op boards: why diplomats and pretty divorcees are frowned upon, what not to wear to a board interview, and which of the biggest celebrities and CEOs have been turned away from the elite buildings of Fifth and Park Avenues. He introduces the carriage-trade brokers who never have to advertise for clients and gives us finely etched portraits of a few of the discreet, elderly society ladies who decide who gets into the so-called Good Buildings.

Here, too, is a fascinating chronicle of the changes in Manhattan’s residential skyline, from the slums of the nineteenth century to the advent of the luxury building. Gaines describes how living in boxes stacked on boxes came to be seen as the ultimate in status, and how the co-operative apartment, originally conceived as a form of housing for the poor, came to be used as a legal means of black-balling undesirable neighbors.

A social history told through brick and mortar, The Sky’s the Limit is the ultimate look inside one of the most exclusive and expensive enclaves in the world, and at the lengths to which people will go to get in.

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On Sale
Aug 1, 2005
Publisher
Hachette Audio
ISBN-13
9781594832420

Steven Gaines

About the Author

Steven Gaines has written many books, including Obsession: The Life and Times of Calvin Klein and, as coauthor, The Love You Make: An Insider’s Story of the Beatles.

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