It's high time I hit up the High Line!

I had heard great reviews about the High Line since it opened in June, but I FINALLY just went to see it this past week! It was just as amazing as I hoped it would be!I lucked out with gorgeous weather!There was fabulous people watching! I mean the clothing and style is just amazing!The natural plantings and the way the original rail ties are blended into the landscaping is really quite striking. Many compliments to James Corner Field Operations and Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the landscape architeture firm and architecture firm responsible for the breathtaking design. Many great sites to take in - I found that some of the dilapidated buildings were so visually intriguing. Isn't it interesting to see the old building and tracks juxtaposed against the new path?Other fun sites include this seating area which looks out onto the avenue below.I loved these chaise lounges! In addition to beautiful green space, this park includes several lovely seating areas, perfect for taking a snack from the Chelsea Market. The High Line was originally built in the 1930's to remove train traffic from Death Avenue, as 10th Ave was known due to the high level of accidents between the street level trains and road traffic in the busy industrial area that was the meat packing district.
The elevated tracks were designed to run over the center of blocks rather than over the avenue to avoid some of the negative conditions of elevated tracks and allowed trains to connect directly to factories and warehouses. The tracks were used until 1980 at which point the space sat vacant for many years.

Fortunately for us, in 1999, Friends of the High Line is formed, advocating preservation and reuse as a public space. Now, the High Line is open from Gansevoort to 20th Street, with plans to open 20th to 30th street in 2010!

It's such a great place to spend an afternoon in NYC!

Photo Credits: the High Line, Huffington Post and Flickr.

Former spaces..

I love the character of old buildings that are converted into living spaces. New York offers many gorgeous apartments that were once warehouses, but there are also a lot of other beautiful conversions too!

This first apartment, located in the West Village was originally a stable built in 1909. The below picture depicts the space in it's original form. If you love the transformation, you're in luck, the apartment is on the market... that is if you have $19.5 million laying around to spend for this penthouse duplex!!! Architect Michael Haverland says "we mixed cool industrial equipment with exposed conduits and outdoor light switches with exposed steel on the stairs and windows and rich, luscious materials like walnut, to create a balance between warm and clean modern looks."This room shows what I love so much about old buildings - those ceilings and support columns add so much detail to the apartment. I'm loving the play of cool (concrete) versus warm (maple) materials in the dining room.
Looking at this apartment has made me start craving steel casement windows! They're so gorgeous here.

This next apartment, was originally built has a synagogue, but over the years, it also housed an underwear factory, a shower-curtain factory, the neighborhood still, a Chinese laundry, and a fabric store. The owners, Thomas Nozkowski, a painter, and his wife Joyce Robins, a sculptor, weren't looking for a cool place to live, but just somewhere cheap where they could both have studio space, and wow, have they lucked out!

Nozkowski and Robins hauled out five truckloads of trash and did most of the renovations, on a budget of $3,000. Renovations that included removing the dropped ceiling that covered the sky light and windows.

I love those balconies over looking the first floor and that sky light is an amazing feature. “The prayer books exude from the woodwork,” says Robins. Jewish tradition dictates “you are not allowed to dispose of them; they have to be buried,” she says. “So the congregation stuffed them in the walls. I collect them. I’m keeping them safe.

And for more blogging fun, hop on over to Hooked on Houses for a blog party!

Photo Credits: New York Magazine