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agapaic · 6 years

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[fic] nothing’s gonna hurt you, baby [3/6]

he tian x mo guan shan

tags/notes: 1920′s au, new york au, reference to drugs and alcohol, gang violence.

links: read on ao3 | part one | part two

this fic was commissioned by @teanshan

part 3: patriotism

He Tian was sitting at the dining table when Guan Shan walked downstairs the next morning, his mouth dry and ashen from the liquor last night.

His pressed suit and concentrated gaze gave him the air of someone who’d been awake hours, and Guan Shan grew self-conscious in the teal silk nightshirt and trousers Jian Yi had given him, hair ruffled from sleep, sheet lines on his skin, eyes wandering blearily—sharp and alert as soon as he saw the man eating breakfast in Jian Yi’s dining room.

‘Good morning,’ He Tian said, blowing the heat from a spoonful of broth.

Guan Shan stood immobile in the doorway. ‘Why are you here?’

He Tian tutted. ‘Impolite,’ he said, and swallowed a mouthful.

Cigarette smoke mixed with salted soup, steamed buns, hot rice, and the tang of newly cut fruit, and Guan Shan’s stomach twisted with hunger. He’d spent too long snooping Jian Yi’s house the day before to use his kitchen, and his dinner at Zhengxi’s had been small and hurried between shifts. The last full meal had been in his mother’s kitchen, congee and fried tofu with greens and braised beef, swallowed down with his mother’s worry lines and the hand she wouldn’t stop holding.

He Tian said, ‘Did you forget? I said the attorney would be here with a contract.’

Guan Shan narrowed his eyes. ‘Yeah. I’m only lookin’ at you.’

He Tian smiled, all teeth. ‘Then you’re looking at my attorney. I don’t trust anyone else to carry out business I can do myself.’ He flicked his fingers across the table. ‘Sit. Eat. Jian Yi’s gone out, and you look wasting.’

The smell of food pulled him to the seat across the table, and Guan Shan cautiously picked up the sheaf of papers that rested beside the laid-out crockery. Stark paragraphs stared up at him, some terms Guan Shan knew and understood, and most he didn’t. He glanced up at He Tian, who was spearing a piece of melon with a fork.

‘What’s this?’ Guan Shan said.

‘What does it look like?’ He Tian said, chewing, helping himself to rice. ‘Your contract.’

The paper crinkled as Guan Shan’s fist closed around it. ‘I can’t understand this shit.’

He Tian said, ‘I know,’ and leaned back in the dining chair, as at home as if the house were his. Maybe it was. ‘It’s a farce,’ He Tian continued. ‘Just as you being my secretary will be a farce. Half of this is make-believe.’

‘You never asked if I could read or write.’

He Tian nodded. ‘Right.’ His head tilted. ‘Can you?’

‘Well enough,’ Guan Shan says sourly. He’d been educated in his village, taught to write mostly by his father from menus and pamphlets and newspapers. His mother would tell him stories as she worked in the house, Guan Shan acting as scribe, following her from room to room with a notebook and pencil. School had been too far from his village in Canton, and he’d never had the smarts or dedication to try for a university. There wasn’t much for his family to be prideful over.

‘I’ll take it,’ He Tian said. ‘Wouldn’t matter if you couldn’t. Eat.’

Guan Shan pushed down the desire to snap back at the command. Hunger won out, and he helped himself to broth and steam buns, peeled lychee and halved, sour-sweet pomelo.

He Tian watched him while he ate, tapped ash out into a cigarette tray, kept his gaze steady through the smoked haze, a lazed insouciance that left Guan Shan tense and nervous. He felt spiked with adrenaline, flashes of heat stabbing at the back of his neck and his thighs, and was grateful for the cracked-open window that let in New York’s cooling, damp autumn air, the chaotic acoustics of the city breaking stale silence.

One thing was abundantly clear to Guan Shan as he ate: dining with the enemy was as good as being in bed with them.

‘You’ve got better things to do than this,’ Guan Shan said eventually, sucking pomelo juice from his thumb, a thin sheen of spit layering his skin.

‘On the contrary,’ He Tian said, eyes on his. ‘I’ve got all day to do this if I choose.’

‘Must be real fucking nice,’ Guan Shan said. ‘That luxury.’

He Tian said, ‘On the contrary.’ He nodded to Guan Shan’s empty bowls, the abandoned fruit peel. ‘Go wash, if you’re finished. I have business I need your assistance with.’

‘Thought you could do this all day,’ Guan Shan said.

‘Thought you wanted a job,’ He Tian countered, smile polite enough to carry a threat.

Guan Shan left to shower.

He Tian drove them north-west through Manhattan in a black car called a Silver Ghost, which, as He Tian informed Guan Shan, was hand-built and one of only seven-thousand made in the world. Guan Shan told him he wasn’t much impressed by cars, sheltered beneath its collapsible fabric hood, eyeing the miniature winged woman made of silver that rose from the bonnet.

‘They’re an acquired taste,’ said He Tian, easing his way through the streets of Manhattan, away from Chinatown’s lower east side, where the bold, modernist buildings of Fifth Avenue and Greenwich Village and West Village rose higher, stretched wider, balconies bursting with flowers and a richness that was foreign and remote and western to Guan Shan, and billboards for cigarettes and Dodge and Ford motors clung to the building sides.

Jian Yi’s townhouse was a bungalow compared to some of the residences that filled the avenues of New York City’s Chelsea, Zhengxi’s restaurant a pale imitator of the glamour that lined the city streets up-town in Madison Square.

An acquired taste.

‘Yeah,’ Guan Shan muttered distractedly. ‘Acquired by people with money.’

He Tian shrugged. ‘Or people with determination,’ he said. ‘With fire.’ His glance towards Guan Shan was pointed, but his eyes didn’t stray from the streets long, pedestrians lining the pavements, decked in raincoats and hoisting umbrellas like rifles over their shoulders. The clouds were a rolling purple, eagerly gathering, and Guan Shan felt the air wait for its rainstorm.

‘Fire doesn’t do anyone much good here if they’re not white.’

He Tian said, ‘That’s what they’d like you to believe.’

Guan Shan went sullen as He Tian pulled the car to a stop. They were on a residential street on the outskirts of Chelsea. Guan Shan could see glimpses of the Hudson River through wide-spaced brownstones, the pier not too far in the distance, choked with ships and docked boats, and fumes from tobacco factories and steel mills soaked the air.

He helped He Tian pull a fitted tarpaulin over the Silver Phantom, and followed him up the few steps to the doorway of one of the residences. The door unlocked with He Tian’s palmed key, and the unremarkable exterior shifted as soon as it closed behind them.

He Tian’s penchant for disguises was becoming distinctly apparent to Guan Shan as he took in the space; normalcy on the outside, a dizzying parade on the inside, where men in suits and women in slim dresses hurried about the building like bees in a hive, spurred on by the smoke of cigarettes and hash, the ground floor open and absent of dividing rooms, like the stretched innards of a warehouse.

If there was music playing, Guan Shan couldn’t hear it over the shouting of back-and-forth voices, of wooden doors slamming and typewriter carriages pealing to a next line, of feet stomping up staircases and floorboards creaking with traffic above. Glasses of liquor and cordial sat like permanent fixtures on the rows of desks that filled the room, green desk lamps like pockets of jade that fit the main hall of the lower floor, and wooden boards stood sentry-like along the walls. They were decorated with profile photographs and typewritten posters stuck with drawing pins like some policing precinct, but there was nothing abiding in the building.

Almost, it had the illusion of a bank: high windows and suited employees and the nervous, commercial energy of professionalism. But it was too obviously apart from that legality. Guan Shan could almost smell the cordite from gunfire, could taste the white buzz of bloodshot eyes and cocaine breath, could feel the red-soaked paper of stolen hundred-dollar notes.

Men and women paused as He Tian pushed through the hall, nodding and letting him pass, glancing up from typewriters and thick stacks of documentation. Someone took his coat, another the key to the car. A stout woman muttered hurried sentences in He Tian’s ear as he nodded and moved ceaselessly towards the staircase, Guan Shan following, upwards and through another identical hall-like room packed with people, and then towards the closed door at the room. The power He Tian held in this building was palpable, energy shifting from harried to focussed as soon as they caught sight of his dark suit and the golden hilt of his cane, which clacked pointedly along the floorboards.

Most alarming to Guan Shan was that no one stopped him; no one questioned him or raised eyebrows at his red hair. He had arrived with He Tian, and that gave him an authority—an immunity—that was frightening.

Guan Shan had no idea who he was dealing with.

Like the bar beneath Zhengxi’s restaurant, the office at the back of the room was solitary and polished, and the sound of the rooms outside was muted as soon as Guan Shan and He Tian were inside, a blanket of cotton wool draped over them.

Guan Shan sat himself down before He Tian’s desk, its owner standing with his shoulder blades hunched back as he poured over an open manilla folder bursting with sheets of paper.

‘The bar under the restaurant isn’t where you work,’ Guan Shan said, running sweaty palms over the fabric of his trousers.

‘Correct,’ He Tian said, flipping through sheets, eyes scanning black and white text with a rabid kind of pace. ‘Farces, remember?’

Guan Shan remembered—substituted farce for disguise in his head.

‘What do you do here?’ he asked. ‘What were all those people doin’?’

‘This and that,’ He Tian replied.

Guan Shan bit the side of his cheek. ‘And d’you want me to do this or that?’

He Tian’s roaming gaze stilled, and with a careful steadiness, he looked up at Guan Shan. ‘What do you think, Guan Shan? What do you think someone like me does?’

‘Isn’t that why I’m fuckin’ asking?’

He Tian’s eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly, but then he collapsed into his desk chair with a cultured ease that seemed planned. He rubbed at his temple with the fingertips of his left hand. With his right, he dug into his desk drawers and threw a box of Turkish Murad cigarettes on the the surface, plucked one out, and lit it with the lighter in his breast pocket.

‘We run betting transactions here, Guan Shan. We handle liquor and opium imports. We ordain the gentlemen’s clubs and the whorehouses and fund the churches. We work with those dirty cop friends you happily condemned.’ He said, ‘We run the city here, Guan Shan.’

Guan Shan remembered the conversation he’d heard last night in the little Chinatown watering hole.

‘You’re a Tong.’

He Tian didn’t blink. ‘That’s a part of it. But that’s China. I’m talking New York.’ He took a drag. ‘Do you know two of the oaths a man takes to join a Tong?’

Guan Shan didn’t.

‘Loyalty, and righteousness,’ He Tian said, holding up forefinger and thumb. ‘Loyalty to one’s people, and a promise to protect those people from outsiders.’ He Tian spread his hands. ‘How’s that going to work in our people’s favour if we shut ourselves off from those outsiders—whose land we live on and work on and shit on?’

It was barely nine o’clock, but Guan Shan thought about the drink He Tian had offered him last night, and he thought he might accept it now.

‘You want our people to—assimilate?’ Guan Shan asked, trying to think of the word. It tasted dirty on his tongue like poorly made cigars and the ash of burnt ginger left too long over a flame.

‘In their eyes, we’re all delinquents. Thieving foreigners. We’re disorganised and lawless and we all want to follow different rules according to our heritage. How can we work with other people if we can’t work with ourselves? Then there’s the Russians, the Italians, the Irish. I want a common goal.’

Guan Shan stared at He Tian. ‘So you want Chinatown to be under your rule? Everyone according to your rules?’

He Tian arched a brow, and tapped his cigarette. ‘Is it not already?’

‘I heard there were wars.’ You can’t rule something when there’s civil war.

‘Old wars led by old people. I don’t belong to that.’

Guan Shan swallowed this. ‘You think—You know you have Chinatown,’ he said, quickly correcting himself. ‘So, what, you’re going for the whole of fucking Manhattan?’

He Tian smiled thinly. ‘Guan Shan. I’m going for the East Coast.’

Something ran down Guan Shan’s spine like a spider, spreading coldness through every web of muscle and capillary and bone fragment. He looked at He Tian, nine o’clock in the morning and running half of New York’s underground, and knew that He Tian believed in everything he was saying.

What scared Guan Shan, scared him in its arrogance, was that he believed in everything He Tian was saying too.

A thought popped into his head easily, unbidden, and it chilled him: How long do you have to run with this dream before they put you down? He Tian’s death seemed like the death of a god, something invincible and winged and too-powerful brought down by the humanness of a bullet or a knife. But Guan Shan knew that men were only men, and as much as he feared He Tian—fuck him and his mortal weaknesses—He Tian was only the same.

‘You’re fucking crazy,’ Guan Shan said.

He Tian chuckled. ‘My brother would be happy to hear that.’

‘Your brother?’

‘He runs the West,’ He Tian explained, a dismissive edge to his tone. ‘He always called the East an untamable beast. It’d be a fucking pleasure to prove him wrong.’

He runs the West.

Fuck, Guan Shan was beyond this.

If He Tian had his hand in every pocket of every citizen in a thousand-mile radius, Guan Shan was a pauper with empty pockets drinking rainwater off the streets. He couldn’t do this. His father was lost to the untamable beast that Guan Shan thought was He Tian before it was the coastline, and Guan Shan was dreaming if he thought he’d ever find his father again. He was going to die here.

‘And where do I fit in all this?’ he asked, fighting to keep his voice steady. ‘You saw me in a restaurant and took me as I was? No money and shitty education and a background you don’t really believe? You don’t seem like the kinda person who makes those kinda mistakes.’

‘Right,’ said He Tian. ‘So if I wanted you, what makes you think I’ve made a mistake?’

‘If you—’ The words shuddered to a stop. ‘Want me for what?’

He Tian shrugged. ‘Company. A second opinion. You interest me.’ He pressed out his cigarette. ‘You ask a fuck ton of questions for someone who just wants money, Mo Guan Shan.’

His full name on He Tian’s tongue was fearful; did He Tian remember Guan Shan’s father’s name? Had he made the connection? Was Guan Shan sitting here, waiting for a moment to strike, and all the while He Tian was waiting for him to do the same with some omniscient arrogance?

‘I don’t trust this,’ Guan Shan told him.

He Tian said, ‘That makes two of us, and I don’t care. You knew my name, where I was. What made you think you could?’ He held up a hand, fingers slender and exposed and silencing. ‘No more questions,’ he said, and tapped a finger on the desk. ‘Business.’

He threw the folder in front of him over to Guan Shan’s side of the desk, and Guan Shan picked it up the same way he approached anything offered to him by He Tian: tentative and cautious and waiting for it to bite. The same way he approached the man himself.

‘What d’you want with this guy?’ Guan Shan asked, leafing through the documented profile of some white politician, a black-and-white photo of the man staring up, his smile a stretch of white teeth that made Guan Shan’s skin crawl, light eyes leering and imposing through the paper.

‘We’re going to pay him a visit,’ He Tian said. ‘Mr Sauer’s parents fled to America in the eighteen-fifties after their pro-democracy politics threw them into government scrutiny. Sauer seems to be a fan of twisting his family’s beliefs to suit his own agenda.’

Guan Shan looked up, mouth twisting. ‘But you want to twist our country’s for your agenda? Fucking hypocrite.’

Wordlessly, immediately, He Tian leaned over and pressed his cigarette into the back of Guan Shan’s hand.

The searing burn was immediate, brief and gone within the second, but it was enough for Guan Shan to cry out and drop the folder into his lap, eyes watering with stinging, welting pain, the smell of burnt skin filling his nostrils.

‘You were saying?’ He Tian said, and relit the cigarette.

Guan Shan cradled his hand against his chest as his body trembled—and glared.

‘Don’t cross me, Guan Shan. Neither of us will like it.’ He reached over again, ignoring Guan Shan’s flinch, and grabbed the folder from Guan Shan’s lap. ‘I have most of Tammany, but I want more than that political machine. I need the right-wingers too if I’m getting this Exclusion Act out of my way.’

Mind reeling from the sudden act of violence, Guan Shan tried to piece himself back together and focus on the conversation. His skin had stopped searing, but it was sore and needed ice, the flesh already risen in a bubble the shape of a cigarette cherry. For some time, Guan Shan knew there would be a scar.

‘Sauer’s my answer to this problem,’ He Tian continued, ‘but if he won’t convert then he needs to get out of my way.’

‘Convert?’ Guan Shan asked, clearing his horse voice.

‘He’s an opioid addict, which is easy leverage. But he’s roughed up some of my girls a few times too many.’ He Tian ran a thumb along his jawline in thoughtful planning. ‘I’m half-hoping he won’t be easy to bait.’

‘It would justify you murdering him.’

He Tian’s smile is cold. ‘When one of my girls ends up in the hospital with her breasts cut open with a knife, we can talk about justification.’

Guan Shan felt his face twist at the starkness of He Tian’s words, undressed and barren. He spoke with a vulgar clarity that clashed with the low smoothness of his voice, an impression that was jarring and left Guan Shan feeling off-kilter. Really, he hadn’t felt balanced since the moment he’d set foot in New York, and He Tian’s character was threatening to throw him over.

‘Why bother with this Sauer guy at all?’ he asked. ‘If he’s such a piece of shit, why try and get him on your side? There’s other guys in government you could bait, right?’

Guan Shan couldn’t think about how easy the words were rolling off his tongue; how easy a concept belonging to He Tian’s world had suddenly become a standard part of his own.

He Tian nodded at him. ‘Many others, but this one’s already in someone else’s pocket, which means he must be worth something to the rest of the righters.’ His tone changed, went careful in a way Guan Shan hadn’t heard before, like he was testing waters. ‘You’ve heard of She Li?’

The name was unfamiliar. ‘Should I have?’

He Tian frowned and became pensive. Guan Shan couldn’t figure out what was puzzling him.

‘She Li wants his own Tong, and he wants to be sheriff.’

‘You’re worried about this guy?’

‘No. But I want to know what he’s selling people like Sauer that makes them want him more than me.’ He looked somewhere above Guan Shan’s head, seeing something Guan Shan couldn’t, eyes unfocused. ‘We’ve tapped his phones and cut through his telegrams, but there’s been nothing. None of my guys know anything, and if they did, I’d know. Whatever he’s doing, he’s hiding it really fucking well.’

‘What if it’s just the same as you? Buying Sauer with heroin and prostitutes?’

‘We’ve found his supplier and tracked it back,’ He Tian said. ‘It’s some big-timer from Chicago my brother knows, not She Li.’

‘And what if She Li’s giving him more than that? More than what he wants?’

He Tian shifted, looking at him blankly. ‘What’s your point?’

‘This—this Sauer fucker. He’s government, right? So what if She Li’s giving the government somethin’. Sauer’s just the in-between, and She Li’s not really giving Sauer anything.’

‘If that’s the case, then Sauer can be compromised. His duty to himself is more important than his patriotism.’

Guan Shan shrugged. ‘Guess you’ll have to meet the guy and find out.’

‘Guess I will,’ said He Tian. ‘And you’ll come with me.’ He rested a weighted gaze on Guan Shan, flipping his lighter in his hand. Guan Shan was growing used to the man’s stillness, his intense silences and dark staring. It made every motion, every rotation of the metal, captivating. ‘You know, you make everything sound easy,’ He Tian said quietly. ‘Simple.’

Guan Shan didn’t know what to make of that. Guan Shan made everything sound easy out of brutal honesty; He Tian was enigmatic and mercurial, except when he was cruel. It made him difficult to grasp, meant his mind must work on overtime, trying to make more sense of things than was needed.

A knock on the door interrupted their strange silence.

The senior woman who’d been muttering in He Tian’s ear when they arrived at the office poked her around the corner.

‘Your brother’s on the wire, sir.’

He Tian looked up, a clouded expression on his face. ‘It’s barely dawn there,’ he muttered to no one in particular, and then, resigned: ‘Give me a moment, Mei Fen.’

Mei Fen nodded, retreated. The door shut behind her, and He Tian had a finger pointed in Guan Shan’s direction as he stood.

‘Stay here,’ he said. ‘We’ll leave after I’m done.’ As he passed, he leaned down into Guan Shan’s ear, his voice kept to a murmur as if someone would hear him—as if it mattered who heard his threat. His breath was hot on Guan Shan’s neck, and Guan Shan caught a glimpse of He Tian’s leather shoulder holster, gun pressing forward on his jacket. ‘I’ll know if you try anything,’ he murmured, close as a lover, ‘and I will do worse than your hand.’

With He Tian gone, the pain from the burn Guan Shan had briefly forgotten now flared with a steady, stinging throb. He clenched his fist, unclenched it, skin shifting over his bones, the blistered flesh crying out with the movement, like pressing at a bruise, or twisting a loose tooth.

There wasn’t much of anything Guan Shan would be able to do while He Tian answered the call, but it didn’t stop him from wandering the perimeter of He Tian’s office barely seconds after the door closed.

Bottles of whisky and baiju and gin filled almost every cabinet, and cigar trays that He Tian didn’t seem to smoke were stacked in neat rows like the unread books. Boxes of documented reports filled the higher cabinets, sheets of paper that Guan Shan flipped through quickly, the listed figures a blur that Guan Shan couldn’t make sense of. Dates and names and locations were crammed into most of the reports, and Guan Shan skimmed them knowing he had no idea what he was looking for.

The drawers of He Tian’s desk were mostly locked, and there was no release switch that Guan Shan could find, fingers running over the smooth underside of the desk. Two pistols and a revolver sat neatly in one of the drawers, beside a box of gilded fountain pens and bottles of dark ink, and a serrated knife lay on a sheaf of starched vellum paper—the same He Tian had used to deliver the message last night.

I just need something, Guan Shan thought desperately, casting hasty glances at the closed door. Something that makes him culpable. Something that connects him.

But there wasn’t—locked cabinets and drawers barred him, and what was available to him—liquor bottles and expensive stationery and guns—gave him nothing. It told Guan Shan everything he already knew: that He Tian was rich, cultured, lawless, and violent. That, if he’d orchestrated his father’s arrival into New York, he wouldn’t leave a trail.

Guan Shan was thinking about the contract He Tian had given him that morning, head bowed over the open drawers of He Tian’s desk, when the door opened.

Guan Shan froze.

They stared at each other in silence, and He Tian shut the door without turning away.

He Tian stared at him. ‘Find what you’re looking for?’ he asked.

Guan Shan glanced down at the revolvers in the drawer, weighing, fuelled by the kind of chaotic, mad impulse his mother would warn him to watch. He’d never fired a gun in his life—didn’t know if they were even loaded. Carefully, Guan Shan pushed the drawer closed, no screeching of unoiled wood, just a smooth insertion, which He Tian watched from the doorway.

His watchful stillness could have told Guan Shan one of four things: none of the guns were loaded; He Tian knew he could pull a gun on Guan Shan faster than Guan Shan could on him; he didn’t believe Guan Shan would be capable of pulling the trigger; or he wasn’t afraid of death.

He would suffer a mortal wound with a smile on his face, and the knowledge that once a gunshot reverberated through the offices, Guan Shan would be dead within minutes.

‘No,’ Guan Shan told him, throat dry. His heart ached in his chest as it crashed against his ribcage. Maybe he’d be shot anyway, the cigarette burn on the back of his hand like a papercut. ‘I didn’t.’

You stupid fuck.

He Tian nodded, as if understanding. ‘Alright,’ he said, and Guan Shan waited for that quick strike of violence He Tian had employed in the office just before—a knife at his head, a pistol aimed at a kneecap.

But there was nothing.

He’s unpredictable, Guan Shan reminded himself. He’ll swipe one time and hunt for three days the next.

The thought did nothing to comfort him, made him only understand that if He Tian exacted no punishment now, then it would come later, when Guan Shan’s guard was down.

He Tian’s coat was draped over his arm, ready to go and find Sauer, and Guan Shan knew that He Tian was going to leave this office with him—or alone.

‘Grab one of those, would you?’ He Tian said, jerking his head towards the desk. ‘The Korovin would do. The blue one with the wooden side panels. Watch the blowback.’

It took a second for Guan Shan to catch up. ‘You want me to give you a fucking gun.’

He Tian smiled, propped himself against the doorframe. ‘I want you to give you a gun. I already have mine.’

Guan Shan had already called He Tian crazy. He was already bewildered by the man’s operations. Guan Shan had nothing to do but gape.

‘Something wrong?’ He Tian asked.

‘No,’ Guan Shan said. And then, as if experiencing some great, philosophical epiphany, ‘You don’t make mistakes.’

He Tian’s smile widened. ‘You’re learning, Guan Shan.’

One of He Tian’s men had been watching Sauer for weeks, trailing him from city hall to grocery store to whorehouse; it made finding his hotel suite at The Pierre easy, dressed in Turkish marble and Indian silks and overlooking the lazed movements of Central Park below, appropriately lavish for the bottles of champagne that rolled across Sauer’s marbled flooring and any sultan or rajah or English lady who wandered into the hotel’s ballroom or tea gardens or glistening lobby.

He Tian sat with his legs crossed in the alcove of an ornate window seat smoking a cigarette, while Sauer hurried to find his underpants and the two French women in his bed found a new residence in the bathroom and locked the door behind them.

Guan Shan stood at the suite’s front door, two of He Tian’s men standing watch in the hallway, and watched the scene play out before him, uncomfortably aware of the gun in his pocket. He Tian had given him a brief lesson on the drive uptown, his instructions matter-of-fact and trained, like teaching Guan Shan how to light a cigarette.

Guan Shan knew how to fight; he knew how to throw a punch. He’d bitten his lip enough times and broken enough teeth against his split knuckles to handle that—righteous kids from his village and thieves on the freight trains—but this was different. There was a detachment in pulling a trigger and ending someone with the sudden finality of a gunshot. It wouldn’t hurt Guan Shan to pull it. He wouldn’t risk bleeding.

‘You won’t even need to use it,’ He Tian told him, palming the keys of his car to a chauffeur with a five-dollar bill.

‘That’s a fucking comfort,’ Guan Shan had muttered in response, and followed He Tian, smirking, into the hotel.

Sauer was bigger than Guan Shan had thought from the photo, closer to He Tian’s height and broad in the shoulders, thick with muscle, but older too. His stomach was softening and the blond line of his hair was fading backwards, the leery glittering eyes in the photo He Tian’d kept now dull and watery. Guan Shan noted his sluggish movements and laboured breath, his light-haired moustache beaded with sweat. In part, Guan Shan could chalk it up to the champagne, to the sex, to He Tian’s casual entry—tell the girls to get the fuck out and get dressed—into his hotel suite. In part, Guan Shan recognised the signs of an addict.

Eventually, Sauer was clothed, shirt tails hanging untucked over the waistline of his trousers, his feet bare. He stood with a hand tight around the bronze rail of the suite bar, darting glances back at Guan Shan every so often, aware that he was sandwiched between the two men, window and door and bathroom barred, and drank deeply, shakily, from a glass of some clear liquid.

He Tian kicked his long legs out in front of him, and got to his feet.

‘Sauer,’ he said, finding the appropriate time for his introduction. ‘Mein Name ist He Tian.’

Sauer’s pallid complexion went translucent.

German, Guan Shan knew less than English, so the conversation that followed was a blur of guttural consonants and cutting exchanges that left Sauer stuttering and red-faced, and He Tian wearing a cool look of impassivity.

The sharper, more stressed Sauer’s responses grew, the lower He Tian’s voice dropped, the bass of each syllable rattling the base of Guan Shan’s throat. This was an interrogation of a hostage, and Guan Shan found himself shifting in discomfort with each question He Tian demanded, the gun growing heavier in his pocket with every panicked response Sauer threw out, arms flailing in defence of accusation. Questions were thrown back and forth, answers blunt and snappish, and Guan Shan only knew He Tian was getting nowhere.

He Tian never moved forward, didn’t shift his weight or make use of the cane in his right hand, a placid lake looked upon at night, movement mistaken for the shimmer of moonlight—so it must have been Sauer who moved first.

His glass smashed to the floor, shrill screaming echoed from the bathroom, and his nose was burst and bloodied before Guan Shan could make sense of any motion.

He stood frozen at the door to the suite as He Tian struck a fist into Sauer’s solar plexus, winding him and feigning to the right to miss Sauer’s strangled swing, and Guan Shan’s hands ached for a fight.

‘Don’t get involved,’ He Tian had told him. ‘Whatever happens.’

Guan Shan resented him for giving orders that were so hard to follow.

Sauer threw slow, heavy-handed punches like a boxer, glass crunching under his feet, his breath panting and shuddered. He managed to catch a fistful of He Tian’s jacket, the momentum causing them to stumble on unsteady feet towards the bar, and He Tian’s head caught on bottles as Sauer dragged him across its surface, hand scrabbling for a shard of broken glass to cut He Tian with.

He never found one, advantage not lasting long; He Tian brought a knee up between Sauer’s spread legs and the German was forced to release his hold on He Tian’s jacket, staggering backwards on impulse.

Guan Shan’s eyes widened as He Tian straightened himself. Blood from Sauer’s nose was soaking his white shirt, and more ran from a glass-made gouge in He Tian’s temple and down to his jaw line, which he wiped away with an impetuous swipe.

His movements towards Sauer were predatory, stalking, each click of his heels thudding with Guan Shan’s racing heartbeat, and he felt himself flinch as He Tian’s cane rose like an arm ready to throw a javelin—and swung.

The cane cracked across Sauer’s face, his shrill cry reverberating as he clutched at his collapsed jaw, and he collapsed backwards onto the marble floor with a thud.

Another swing caught Sauer’s raised hand across the knuckles, and Guan Shan swallowed at the nausea that was rolling in his stomach as the bones of Sauer’s fingers snapped.

He Tian wasn’t smiling as he stood over the man, showed no outward sign of pleasure at the slaughter, and Guan Shan didn’t know if that was better or worse—that he could do this, break a man, with such cold efficiency and feel nothing.

‘He Tian,’ he said quietly. ‘I think he gets the message.’

It would take weeks for Sauer’s jaw to work again, for a string of words to come out that didn’t make his eyes water, longer for him to be able to hold a pen or a gun or his cock. He Tian needed him damaged and warned and out-of-action. This wasn’t a necessity.

He Tian’s dark look could only be received as a glare. ‘I wasn’t here to threaten, Guan Shan,’ he said. ‘You knew that.’

Guan Shan knew. Convert or get out of He Tian’s way. Justifiable murder.

‘You could use him,’ Guan Shan said. ‘Use him as a mole.’

Sauer was left groaning on the floor while He Tian stalked towards the bar, found an unharmed bottle of gin swimming with dark berries, and took a swig. His chest rose even and strong, and his fingers tightened and untightened around the handle of his cane as he wiped his mouth into the arm of his jacket, spat blood on the floor, lit up a cigarette. Ineffective from where he stood in the doorway, Guan Shan caught a glimpse of He Tian’s split knuckles.

‘A mole,’ He Tian said bitterly. ‘He’s useless to me. Denies knowing anything about She Li. Either he’s telling the truth or She Li’s got him hooked tighter than I thought, and I don’t have the time to break him.’

Guan Shan glanced at Sauer, moaning over the warped shape of his right hand, clutching it to his chest.

‘You offered him opium?’

He Tian threw a disgusted look at the politician. ‘Offered him the fucking moon.’

He stubbed his cigarette out onto the bar and stretched his hands across his surface. Strands of slick-backed hair draped in front of his eyes like thin shadows. He was still standing, barely wounded, but he wore the heavy air of someone who’d suffered a defeat.

‘He’s the third one,’ He Tian admitted. And then, ‘Who knew these fuckers’ prejudices ran this deep.’

It felt strange to be having a conversation while a man agonised on the floor between them, but then maybe He Tian was right: all of this was about the Exclusion Acts. The Irish and the Russians and the Italians—where were the acts being placed against them? Where were their alliances for the Chinese when America had been birthed from foreigners and built on the back of its brown-skinned natives?

If the right-wing politicians wouldn’t budge while people back in Guan Shan’s village and neighbouring towns risked starvation and poverty weekly, risked travelling thousands of miles to feed their families, maybe this was the answer.

This rushed through his head in a few seconds, some burst of moral outrage that Guan Shan didn’t know what to do with—and then movement caught his eye.

He didn’t know where Sauer had gotten it from, how either He Tian or Guan Shan had missed the palm-sized pistol now held in Sauer’s left hand, but Guan Shan’s body burst into a cold-hot flame that was singular to fate-driven moments like these.

The gun was pointed at He Tian’s back.

Like the jerky, fast-paced movements of a movie star, there was a blurred sequence of events that Guan Shan would only recollect in agonising slowness later: Sauer lifting himself up from the floor with a strained groan, He Tian turning in response to Guan Shan’s silence, Guan Shan taking a step forward that seemed to take a lifetime, like trying to run from a monster in a nightmare, hand moving to the inside of his jacket, wondering who was the monster? Who was the victim? Who would get their throat torn out and their blood worn like a mask and—

Bang.

Guan Shan never knew how loud it would be, eardrums fractured from the sound so close and confined in a room made of marble and crystal and silk. He didn’t know how it would suck out everything until he was left with something deeper than silence, a vacuum emptiness that made his ears ring with shallow dissonance, how movement would blur and stumble in his vision, reason abandoning him.

But he learnt quickly.

He caught up with himself on the drive to Zhengxi’s, He Tian’s men leaning over their boss’ body with heavy-handed presses on his shoulder in the back of the car, He Tian’s face moon-white and sheened with sweat, brows drawn and lip curling in pain and irritation.

Sauer’s face swam in Guan Shan’s head as the driver took sharp turns that made He Tian groan, narrowly missing carriages and cyclists and other cars.

The German had worn a quiet look of surprise before he died. Oh, it said, red stain spilling across his back like the mistake of a clumsy waiter, pistol clattering to the tiles, head hitting the marble with a dull thud declaring lifelessness.

The hired girls screamed in the bathroom after the gunshot, and soon the suite doors had burst open, He Tian’s men cramming themselves into the room, piecing together the events—Sauer dead, He Tian wounded, Guan Shan holding a gun—in a belligerent rush.

‘He’s with me,’ He Tian had gritted out as they turned on Guan Shan, hunched over and clutching at his shoulder by the bar, and then it was a rush down the hotel’s back staircase, feet stomping against the metal, He Tian almost carried down the stairs, and into the car waiting among kitchen fumes and trash bags.

They were in Chinatown when Guan Shan refocused his eyes again. Zhengxi was already waiting outside the restaurant, which remained closed until the evening, and He Tian’s men were helping their boss to stagger inside before the car’s engine had even been cut.

There was a padded table laid out in front of Zhengxi’s desk that trembled as He Tian was lifted onto it, and beside it sat a metal tray of instruments and a bowl of water and rolls of bandages on what looked like a liquor cart.

‘No questions, just fix me up?’ Zhengxi asked impassively, already cutting away at He Tian’s clothing with a pair of scissors, his swift, steady actions and words like an echo of a previous time. Previous times.

‘I knew I’d hired you for a reason,’ He Tian managed to reply, humour ashen, drinking from a supplied bottle of vodka.

Zhengxi snorted. ‘Jian Yi hired me. Not you.’

He Tian tried to rise up onto his elbows. ‘And who hired Jian Yi?’

Zhengxi shoved He Tian back onto the table, unleashing a string of colourful curses from He Tian’s mouth, and peered pragmatically at He Tian’s bullet wound with a magnifying glass. He didn’t look at Guan Shan, but Guan Shan knew Zhengxi had seen him when they entered, marking Guan Shan’s presence with a soft frown that said, It didn’t take you long.

‘How close was it?’ Zhenxgi asked, picking up the necessary tools for extraction. He squinted. ‘At least it hasn’t fragmented.’

His remarks left He Tian lolling his head on the bench until his eyes met Guan Shan’s, who was standing before the closed office door, conscious of the weight of his limbs, the dryness of his throat, how quiet he felt—removed, and numb, stuck inside a goldfish bowl where the outside was misshapen and muted, head knocking dully against the glass, the skin of his hand still vibrating.

It hadn’t even hurt.

When Guan Shan blinked, he realised He Tian’s eyes weren’t glassy with pain, with the hazy clouding of the wounded, but startlingly clear, like pain was a crystalliser. It made him less murky, and Guan Shan could see the scars that littered his chest, some the neat lines of a knife swipe, others deep gouges that dimpled his torso, well-muscled and sweat-soaked, the mawling spread of a panther tattoo twisting across his skin, tail disappearing below his navel.

‘You saved my life,’ He Tian said, the last word marked with a wince while Zhengxi doused the wound and filled the office with the smell of ethanol.

Guan Shan had no honest answer. He could only think, I saved your life, and I don’t know why. Part of him argued that it was for his father, because if He Tian died then Guan Shan’s father died with him. But another part of him was clouded and voiceless, and Guan Shan had no reason to want to save the life of a man like him, whom he’d known barely a day. No reason at all.

‘Patriotism. Sauer was gonna kill you,’ was all he offered. You told me I wouldn’t need it.

He Tian sniffed at the lie. ‘He nearly did, if you hadn’t shot him first. Shame you couldn’t have done it before he pulled the trigger.’ He Tian gritted his teeth, closed his eyes, then said, ‘Felt some hesitation, did you?’

Guan Shan said, ‘What if I said yeah?’

Somehow, He Tian’s gaze was steady for a few moments as Zhengxi released the bullet, packing the wound with swabs of cotton. He hid drunkenness and agony well enough that it was frightening—and then he closed his eyes with a deep exhale.

‘Doesn’t matter,’ he muttered. ‘You still did it.’

Right, Guan Shan thought, leaning back against the door, staring at the ceiling. The gun was a lead weight against his heart. I still did it.

If you liked my work, please reblog this post so others can find it, consider donating to me via Ko-Fi for a drabble, or commissioning me for a fic!

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#19 days #19 days fanfiction #tianshan #old xian #he tian #mo guan shan #my fanfic #pls reblog if you enjoyed!!#commissions

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abbysroad · 6 years

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visions of johanna

The feeling always hit when the restaurant was empty and I was scraping hardened fudge from the bottoms of ice cream dishes. The old ladies came in the late afternoon and ordered butter pecan or maple walnut and left big tips and smiled at me because I was young, and I wondered which cone would be their last, and whether they wondered it too. And I thought of being very old, spooning nutty sweet stuff between wrinkled lips, and wondered if I’d be ready then.

That anxiety hit harder and darker on Mondays at dawn when the newspaper went to print and the morning joggers began to sweat and I had to try to fall asleep, wondering what good it would do me on my deathbed to have seen my name printed atop the masthead of my college newspaper. It hit when my sense of direction failed me, as it often did when I walked alone at night or tried to find a subway station I hadn’t used before. When I felt my efforts were futile. When I knew that I was small.

Bob Dylan must have felt it too, when he knew the sound he was striving for, “that thin, that wild mercury sound,” but couldn’t reach it, not in New York, not anymore. After The Times They Are a-Changin’, after Highway 61 Revisited, after electric sets in Europe and spats with fans who felt he’d betrayed his folk roots, Dylan returned to make rock music in the city where Woody Guthrie lay dying. But New York was suffocating him, the way it suffocates every dreamer from out of town the moment the car horns and clamor pound him with a headache it seems death alone could soothe. So after nights of writing poems for the pregnant wife who slept beside him in the Chelsea Hotel, after 14 attempts at recording a ballad he called “Freeze Out” in autumn 1965, Dylan left New York.

In Nashville, Dylan stayed up all night with his amphetamines recording the hour and 12 minutes of frenetic noise that made up Blonde On Blonde. He renamed “Freeze Out” to “Visions of Johanna” and recorded it in a single take. The seven-and-a-half-minute ballad, an ode to dissatisfaction, to striving for some unattainable ideal, defined an album borne out of uncertainty and fear, both personal and political. Fifty years after its release, it rings as clearly as ever.

The name “Johanna” derives from the Hebrew “Yohannah,” meaning “God is great.” Maybe she’s a distant lover, so perfect that to exist without her is agony. Maybe she represents a utopic end to the turbulent sixties, an imagined era free of social inequality. Or maybe she is the promise of a god awaiting us all at the end. Either way, this city — with its tiny apartments and nonstop subway lines and delivery trucks that prowl in the night — New York “just makes it all too concise and too clear that Johanna’s not here.”

In a song with no bridge, no refrain, no purpose besides the words delivered in verses that don’t seem to end, Dylan rambles on, surrendering to visions over which he has no control. In the crucial lines, he sings, “Inside the museums, infinity goes up on trial / Voices echo ‘This is what salvation must be like after a while,” as if to reassure himself that there is some solace in art, despite the uncertainty of whether salvation — Johanna — exists at all. “Visions of Johanna,” in its endlessness, struck me as salvation itself, a respite from my doubts and fears uttered by someone who had felt them too.

Apart from a few years in the seventies, Dylan never spent any serious time in New York again. He has lived in Woodstock and in Malibu. He has released more than 30 more albums, none as fraught with anxiety and idealism as Blonde On Blonde. And for the past 30 years, he has toured, never pausing for more than three months, as if fleeing that feeling bred of idleness and fear.

New York was my Johanna when my brother enrolled at Columbia 10 years ago. I remember touring Greenwich Village with him when I came to visit once. I was small enough then that he would hoist me up on his shoulders while I clutched his hair and marveled at what this new vantage point let me see. He showed me the only free-standing house in Manhattan, with a little lawn and stone driveway, and he carved our initials into the wood tabletop of one of those old pizza joints whose graffiti gives it character, and we waited in line for cupcakes he said were the best in the world, and I believed it, that New York myth.

I came to college at NYU, a short walk from these sites I’ve always remembered but could never quite place. On a recent spring evening teeming with pale-faced people desperate for sun, I set out on the Village streets where Dylan once roamed, determined to ground this memory in places that were real.

West of Seventh Avenue it feels like Boston, cobblestoned streets running narrow and crooked down to the dirty water. I knew the house when I saw it: white shingles and little square windows and a wrought-iron fence on Charles Street, unchanged. Satisfied, I headed back to the part of the city with tall buildings and numbered streets that don’t let me get lost. I passed the Magnolia Bakery, its line of patrons still stretching out the door. And then, on West 11th Street, beneath a fire escape zig-zagging up a five-story townhouse, I saw above the door, in stone blackened from years of neglect, the words engraved: THE JOHANNA.

At last I had found my way.

#bob dylan #writing #visions of johanna #blonde on blonde

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thejajoftravel · 2 years

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Stacy Small, of Elite Travel International, on The Greenwich Hotel

When Stacy Small, founder/president of LA-based Elite Travel International lands in NYC, she loves checking into a cozy luxurious hotel that feels more like a private home than a hotel. This, says Stacy, is The Greenwich.

The Greenwich is my favorite hotel downtown, and an ideal location for anyone wanting easy access to the hot Tribeca restaurants and trendy Soho shops. The lobby of the townhouse-style property feels more like an elegant living room, and the garden courtyard is the best place in the city to enjoy breakfast or cocktails in a discreet but happening setting. My favorite suites are the corner fireplace suites, with furnishings that remind me of my global travels—Swedish Duxiana beds, Italian Carrara marble bathrooms, English leather couches. None of the 88 rooms/suites are alike, which lend a further residential feel to the property. I also love the complimentary Wifi and the complimentary minibar with delicious (and healthy) snacks and beverages. If only every luxury hotel included such thoughtful touches. The Zen-like spa indoor pool and fantastic gym are additional reasons I—and my clients—adore returning time and again to The Greenwich.

Stacy Small Founder/President, Elite Travel International www.elitetravelinternational.com Stacy Small has a following of nearly 50,000 on Twitter as @EliteTravelGal and is the go-to luxury travel advisor for a mix of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, C-level execs, Hollywood producers, celebs, media, fashion, technology & finance moguls.

#thejajoftravel nyc visitnyc nychotel luxury luxuryhotel thegreenwichhotel travel traveling traveler traveladdict

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mariaclaragomez276 · 4 years

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The ultimate London city guide

What to do in the king (or queen) of all capitals

You’d be forgiven for wondering where to start when it comes to a break in London. The city’s size, scale and layers of history mean the options can seem overwhelming. But combine a few famous sights with a sprinkle of lesser known gems and you’ll soon see why London is the city that everyone falls in love with. And why millions of people from around the world have made it their home.

A short round-up of London’s must-see sights…

St Paul’s Cathedral: Sir Christopher Wren’s domed masterpiece, offering the best views over the city from the Golden Gallery, a gasp-inducing 528 steps up.

Tate Modern: The best international modern art showcased in a former power station on the Thames, with an awe-inspiring turbine hall.

National Gallery: Masterpiece follows masterpiece, set in Trafalgar Square and watched over by Nelson’s column – and several thousand pigeons.

Buckingham Palace: Look out for the flag – if it’s at full mast, the Queen’s at home.

Tower of London: The crown jewels, 1000 years of history and ravens all in one place.

Westminster Abbey: Visit the place where royalty are crowned, married and buried. Poet’s Corner is the final resting place of legendary writers from Chaucer to Dickens.

… and some ideas to round off your trip

Magical markets

If you’re in the city at a weekend, make time for street markets. For independent arts and crafts, head to Spitalfields. Colombia Road Flower Market fills the street with blooms as far as the eye can see – get there early for the best picks. Portobello Road is the destination for antiques and to admire the pastel facades of the upmarket Notting Hill area. And Borough Market is a mecca for food and drink – including (probably) the best toasted cheese sandwich in the world.

Parks and gardens

London isn’t short of green spaces. Historic Hyde Park sits proudly in the centre of the city, and is famously endorsed by the royals. But venture just over the Thames and Battersea Park is a hidden gem – with gardens, a boating lake and a children’s zoo. Just north of the centre, leafy Hampstead Heath has city views and swimming ponds that are open all year if you’re brave enough.

Jaunts on the water

The beating heart of the city, the River Thames connects many of London’s best sights and you can easily base a day around its banks. After a ride on the London Eye, taking in Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, stroll along the scenic Southbank. Grab a coffee on a riverside terrace, or stop at a pop-up bar for a craft beer. Then hop onto a river bus for a cruise east, past the glass towers of Canary Wharf, to Greenwich – where you’ll find the Cutty Sark, the Royal Observatory, and… another palace.

What – and where – to eat in London

For dinner with a view…

When you’re on the 31st floor of London’s tallest building, you’re guaranteed a vista. Aqua at the Shard doesn’t disappoint

For afternoon tea…

The city is your oyster for this most quintessential of English traditions – but for a quirky, one-of-a-kind experience try sketch

For a roast…

Britons take Sunday lunch very seriously. Head to a gastropub like The Harwood Arms for the best offerings

For fish and chips…

This is where your local chippy outshines most of the top offerings. Douse your chips in vinegar and lashings of ketchup

For international flavours…

Brixton Market is a must-visit for a true taste of the melting pot that is London. Hole-in-the-wall restaurants there are gaining serious reputations

For celebrity spotters…

The Chiltern Firehouse is a safe bet if you’ve got your eyes peeled for A-listers

A haven in the heart of the city

The best boutique hotels in London to retreat to after a day in the thick of things.

THE AMPERSAND… unique interiors inspired by London’s most famous museums, including the V&A.

THE LALIT… Indian hospitality meets British tradition, with rich colours and a fusion spa.

THE FRANKLIN… Gatsby-era glamour round the corner from the luxury shopping of Knightsbridge.

VINTRY & MERCER… quirky luxury boasting an exclusive speakeasy bar and a roof terrace restaurant with skyline views.

DUKES LONDON… a sophisticated home-from-home, featuring the bar that inspired James Bond’s famous martini.

THE PRINCE AKATOKI… minimalist, clean décor with Japanese influences, and a fine selection of whiskies and sakes to indulge in after a day in town.

FLEMINGS MAYFAIR…a chic townhouse hotel in one of London’s most exclusive addresses.

ST. JAMES’S HOTEL & CLUB…a hidden gem conveniently placed for the best West End shopping and theatres.

THE CAPITAL HOTEL & APARTMENTS…enviably located just yards from Harrods and Harvey Nichols.

THE ACADEMY…straight from a Georgian period drama complete with library – the perfect spot for a craft gin cocktail.

The post The ultimate London city guide appeared first on Small Luxury Hotels.

from Small Luxury Hotels https://ift.tt/2wT3KgX Publish First on

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bluemagic-girl · 4 years

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🔥The fast-changing areas for home buyers to have on their radar in 2020🔥

Buyers looking to start the 2020s in a new London home face big decisions, the first being how close to the centre of the capital they need to be. But if the answer is “very”, the options don’t necessarily have to be limited.

Factors such as a history of good price growth — but with room to grow in the future — and regeneration potential are as important as the quality of local housing stock, the range of transport links and local amenities.

As the new decade gets under way Homes & Property shares its tips for London locations which appear to tick all the boxes.

Greenwich Peninsula

Greenwich Peninsula is a waterfront suburb with thousands of new homes (Daniel Lynch)

If you like your regeneration zones box fresh, this £8.4 billion project could be just the thing.

In total 15,000 new homes, shops, cafés, bars, restaurants and 48 acres of open space is creating a new waterfront suburb in the shadow of The O2.

The nearest station is North Greenwich on the Jubilee line with services taking just two minutes to Canary Wharf, eight to London Bridge and 18 to Bond Street.

Two new schools are part of the scheme and nearby Millennium Primary is rated “outstanding” by Ofsted.

Why Greenwich Peninsula is tipped as one to watch in 2020

It’s going to be a big year for the peninsula with the completion of Upper Riverside, one of a series of planned new residential neighbourhoods.

This year will also bring the Design District, a business district for creatives with studio, workshop and desk spaces, galleries, a basketball pitch and walkways.

The pros: vast investment is creating an innovative location with masses to do for all age groups, morning, noon and night.

As the population grows, so will the vibrancy of the area.

The cons: at present there are no senior schools on the peninsula. St Mary’s Magdalene C of E School has Years 7 to 10 at the moment, and will cater for Years 11 to 13 by 2022. Other options in Woolwich and Greenwich include the excellent St Ursula’s Convent School but there are also some, such as the Royal Greenwich Trust School, not currently well rated.

Average house prices in Greenwich Peninsula — and what there is to buy

The peninsula is in SE10 where the average price of £550,000 covers a huge range, from seven-figure riverfront penthouses to majestic period houses in Greenwich village, and down.

Upper Riverside prices start at £550,000 and you could buy a three-bedroom flat with wonderful views for just over £1 million.

A four-bedroom townhouse at Greenwich Millennium Village is £900,000, while in a slightly older scheme, £430,000 to £500,000 buys a two-bedroom flat, or you’d pay £300,000 for a one-bedroom flat.

Barking Riverside

East London’s biggest development, with plans for more than 10,000 new homes, shops, restaurants, schools and leisure facilities is taking shape on a 443-acre site that was once home to a huge power station.

Work started on the £3.5 billion project in 2008 and will finish around 2025. When complete there will be seven new on-site schools and a population of up to 30,000. The Barking Riverside site has a mile of tidal Thames frontage, with big skies, mudflats and a nature reserve

Why Barking Riverside is tipped as one to watch in 2020

Transport for London is on track to complete a two-mile London Overground extension in 2021, giving Barking Riverside a train link to Barking and beyond. Journeys to central London will take just over 20 minutes. Transport improvements have a strong record of increasing property prices — just look at Crossrail.

The pros: the site has a mile of tidal Thames frontage, with big skies, mudflats and a nature reserve. Negotiations to add the area to the Thames Clipper river bus service are ongoing, as are plans for a safe, segregated cycleway between Barking Riverside and Ilford.

The cons: an entirely new neighbourhood can feel soulless and the nearest neighbour, Barking, is very run down, though regeneration plans are afoot. Early residents who moved to Barking Riverside in 2012 complained of feeling very isolated. A growing population and new station will help.

Average house prices in Barking Riverside — and what there is to buy

The starting point is just under £60,000 for 25 per cent of a one-bedroom shared-ownership flat. Full ownership of a one-bedroom flat starts at £262,500. London Help to Buy is available (barkingriverside.london).

Old Kent Road

Teetering on the edge of regeneration for the past several years, a series of massive developments could finally change the fortunes of an area which has for generations been known as a cheap buy on the Monopoly board.

This ancient route from Bermondsey towards New Cross has been used by Londoners since the Celts ruled England, and was later paved by the Romans. Today it is dismally scruffy but its future looks increasingly upbeat, with new homes and facilities on the horizon.

Stations nearby include Zone 1 Elephant & Castle on the Northern line Tube, and South Bermondsey, with five-minute trains to London Bridge. But a real game changer, down the line, would be if the Bakerloo line extension goes ahead and Old Kent Road gets a station of its own. Transport for London will make a decision over the next couple of years.

Local schools include Phoenix Primary School, which gets top marks from Ofsted, and Townsend Primary School, Pilgrims’ Way Primary School, Ark Walworth Academy (seniors), which all have “good” inspection reports. Planning permission has been granted for Cantium, a new mixed-use development at 520 Old Kent Road, bringing more than a thousand new homes, including a 48-storey tower

Why Old Kent Road is tipped as one to watch in 2020

Developers are poised to start massive investment in the area. Last March Galliard Homes and Aviva Investors were given planning permission for Cantium, a £600 million mixed-use scheme at 520 Old Kent Road, including a 48-storey landmark tower, 1,113 new homes, new piazzas, a public square and a linear park.

In total, £10 billion is expected to be spent on developments along the road, focusing on the two miles between the Bricklayers Arms roundabout and the junction with Ilderton Road.

Pros: close to the bars and restaurants of neighbouring Bermondsey and Peckham, and enjoying a ripple of buyers priced out of these areas.

Cons: right now it’s grotty and traffic-clogged, and its going to be a building site during the short and medium term. Some of the developers will probably hold fire until a decision on whether the Bakerloo line extension is happening.

Average house prices in Old Kent Road — and what there is to buy

Most of Old Kent Road is in SE15, a postcode with an average price of £570,000 according to Rightmove, up around a third in the past five years.

£650,000: a three-bedroom terrace house just off Old Kent Road in Peckham

Property on and around the road ranges from elegant Victorian townhouses close to Burgess Park, to smaller period terrace houses around the Bermondsey and Peckham borders. A three-bedroom house would cost £600,000 to £700,000.

Two-bedroom flats on the northern side of the Old Kent Road cost £450,000 to £500,000 but buyers will find better value closer to New Cross, where there are two-bedroom terrace houses priced at £450,000 to £500,000, and one-bedroom purpose-built flats priced between £250,000 and £300,000.

Brentford, west London

One of the capital’s many industrial backwaters getting a much-needed makeover, Brentford is the west London hotspot you can afford.

Thousands of new homes are under construction overlooking the area’s three waterways – the Thames, the River Brent and Grand Union Canal – bringing with them new shops, restaurants and cultural and sporting facilities.

These new homes are augmenting the area’s existing stock of period houses, and although out in Zone 4 Brentford’s transport links are fast – trains to Waterloo station take just over half an hour.

Most local schools hold at least a “good” Ofsted report and Lionel Primary School and Gunnersbury Catholic School (seniors) are both considered “outstanding” by the schools’ watchdog.

The Brentford Project is set to bring 900 new homes, an arts centre and cinema

Why Brentford is tipped as one to watch in 2020

The smart money gets in early in the regeneration process for maximum uplift. Ballymore launched the first homes at its 12-acre site by the River Brent in September, with “exciting announcements” expected this year on the shops due to move into a rejuvenated high street.

The Brentford Project will eventually include almost 900 homes, plus facilities including a leisure centre, and an arts centre and cinema. Prices start at £442,500 for a one-bedroom flat; two-bedroom flats are priced from £652,000. Visit thebrentfordproject.com.

Ballymore is not alone in scenting potential in this town. Brentford Football Club’s home is getting a new stadium plus new homes, and another 700 or so homes are coming at Brentford Lock West (brentfordlockwest.co.uk) beside the Grand Union Canal.

The pros: proximity to the lovely Syon and Gunnersbury Parks.

The cons: regeneration comes at a price. Boat owners at the moorings at Waterman’s Park have been moved on to make way for a new marina. The High Street is basic and marred by empty shops. Motorway noise from the M4 blights some streets on the north side of Brentford.

Average house prices in Brentford — and what there is to buy

Average prices in TW8 have topped the £500,000 barrier, at £511,000 according to Rightmove. Five years ago the average price was just £376,000.

There’s not a huge number of houses in this area, which pushes up prices. A two- to three-bedroom period terrace house will cost around £550,000 to £650,000.

Flats are in plentiful supply and the new homes landing in the area have also pushed average prices upwards. Buyers have a good choice of newish two-bedroom flats – and the odd period conversion – for around £450,000 to £500,000.

More dated purpose-built two-bedroom flats have price tags closer to £300,000.

Poplar, east London

Makeover: the transformation of ChrispStreet Market is part of the multibillion-pound Poplar regeneration

Its location just north of Canary Wharf means this former Victorian slum has long been ripe for regeneration.

Now, finally, Call the Midwife country is being reinvented for the 21st century. In the pipeline are some 3,000 flats – in new buildings and revived brutalist landmarks – plus shops, offices and new parks.

There are also a few streets of period houses for families in search of a traditional home, while one of the area’s four primary schools gets an “outstanding” report.

For older children, Langdon Park Community School is rated “good”. Poplar is served by several Docklands Light Railway stations, all Zone 2.

Why Poplar is tipped as one to watch in 2020

A hugely symbolic year is in prospect for this ugly duckling of the East End as residents move back into the newly restored Balfron Tower.

The brutalist Sixties landmark designed as social housing by Ernő Goldfinger (of Notting Hill’s Trellick Tower fame), has been rebooted as upscale apartments. One-bedroom flats start at £365,000. Visit balfrontower.co.uk.

The pros: much more affordable than Canary Wharf. Lots of change on the cards. The old-school Chrisp Street Market is in line for a £280 million redevelopment with apartments and a new market, despite existing traders claiming they could be pushed out of the area. As well as stalls, there will be space for one-off events such as live music, ice rinks, vintage fairs and open-air screenings.

Regeneration of the sprawling Aberfeldy Estate, renamed Aberfeldy Village, is well under way, with more than 1,000 homes plus shops, a gym and a linear park, completing by around 2025. The High Street has a reasonable selection of useful shops, and there is green space in the form of Bartlett Park and Poplar Recreation Ground.

The cons: for all the billions of pounds being spent, Poplar is still rough and ready. The architectural Marmite that was the Robin Hood Gardens estate has been lost to redevelopment despite huge opposition to its demolition from leading architects. Critics say locals are hopelessly priced out of all the shiny new apartments springing up.

Average house prices in Poplar — and what there is to buy

Poplar shares a postcode with Canary Wharf and the Isle of Dogs, and the average price in E14 is £512,000 up a respectable 15 per cent in the past five years.

In Poplar a budget of £500,000 will buy a one-bedroom flat at Orchard Wharf by Galliard Homes, with the added benefit of a communal roof terrace with amazing views.

You could equally buy a more dated two-bedroom purpose-built flat, or a two- to three-bedroom period terrace house – although the challenge here will be finding one.

Woolwich, south-east London

Berkeley Homes’ multibillion-pound regeneration of the Woolwich Arsenal features 5,000 new homes (Daniel Lynch)

Five miles down the Thames from Canary Wharf, Woolwich is shaping up as a real alternative, with Berkeley Homes’ multibillion-pound regeneration of the Woolwich Arsenal, featuring 5,000 new homes plus bars and restaurants revamping the waterfront, and Crossrail due to upgrade transport links in 2021.

Down the line, British Land is planning a five-acre mixed development on inland Woolwich’s grotty high street, while Greenwich council has pledged £40 million to repurpose a series of historic buildings on the waterfront into arts and cultural venues.

A former ammunitions factory will become a performance venue with seating for more than 4,000 people.

Transport is provided by DLR (Zone 4), and schools include the Ofsted “outstanding” St Peter’s Catholic Primary School and Cardwell Primary School.

Why Woolwich is tipped as one to watch in 2020

Of all London’s regeneration zones, CBRE tips Woolwich to enjoy the biggest “regeneration house price growth premium” – 7.6 per cent per year.

The pros: the river. Plenty of green space, in the shape of Oxleas Wood and Plumstead Common.

The cons: Woolwich’s waterfront flats are expensive, and the streets of period homes further inland have a rather bedraggled air. Local council estates are downright scruffy.

Average house prices in Woolwich — and what there is to buy

An average home in SE18 costs £481,000, according to Rightmove, up from £272,000 five years ago – a massive 77 per cent.

These average figures hide a massive range of homes. Berkeley Homes is currently selling a splendid two-bedroom duplex at Royal Arsenal Riverside for £1.3 million. But you can buy a two-bedroom flat at the site from £600,000.

In the town centre you could pick up a four-bedroom period house for between around £550,000 and £600,000.

Prices for apartments drop the further from the river you move. A two-bedroom flat would cost between around £350,000 and £400,000, or less for ex-local authority property.

Bayswater, west London

Whiteleys shopping centre is being redesigned with new shops and restaurants, along with luxury new homes

Historically, Bayswater has been the shabbiest but also the least expensive of the neighbourhoods encircling Hyde Park.

Its shops may lack excitement but its Zone 1 location is brilliant, its unconverted townhouses are elegant and, most importantly, regeneration is gathering pace.

You can walk to the West End or hop on the Central line at Queensway station or the District and Circle from Bayswater. From 2021 a short walk to Paddington will be rewarded by Crossrail services direct to the City or Canary Wharf.

“With its neighbour Notting Hill to the west and Marylebone to the east, where values can easily exceed £3,000 per square foot, Bayswater has long been the forgotten area of prime central London,” says buying agent Caspar Harvard-Walls, partner at Black Brick.

The reason for Bayswater’s Cinderella status? “Bayswater is blighted by Queensway, which is dominated by fast-food takeaways and mobile phone shops.”

Why Bayswater is tipped as one to watch in 2020

The clean-up of Bayswater is already clear. The first homes at the landmark Grade II-listed former Whiteleys shopping centre, which closed in 2018, go on sale this year. Prices are still to be confirmed and if you need to ask, you probably can’t afford one.

There will also be shops and restaurants at the redesigned centre, rebooted by starchitect Norman Foster. Meanwhile, a cluster of smaller developments on and around Queensway will have more flats, shops and offices that will generally smarten up the street.

The pros: Bayswater is relatively underpriced for its prime location, and Crossrail and regeneration will produce price growth.

“We know the effect that improving the public realm has on property values,” says Harvard-Walls. “The redevelopment of Marylebone High Street, Mount Street in Mayfair and Sloane Square in Chelsea have led to surges in the price per square foot in those areas. We expect 2020 to be the year the wider market really starts to sit up and take notice of Bayswater.”

The cons: it is good value for prime London, but it’s still not cheap. And there are still too many shabby two-star hotels.

Average house prices in Bayswater — and what there is to buy

An average home in W2 costs £1.25 million, according to Rightmove. Unlike other prime districts, where prices have flopped 20 per cent in the past two years, values are up slightly, from £1.2 million five years ago.

White stucco townhouses, often divided into flats, could again become the area’s loveliest homes, priced at £1,500 to £1,600 per square foot for a modernised property.

Prices for newer purpose-built flats are considerably more affordable at about £1,000 per square foot.

Goodmayes, on the fringes of London and Essex

Game-changer: Weston Homes is planning a major development of almost 1,300 new homes

Right on the fringes of London and Essex, Goodmayes has got a quiet and leafy suburban feel and the kind of quality Edwardian housing which would be totally unaffordable if it was a little closer to central London.

Nobody could claim it is a chichi urban village, but this multicultural neighbourhood has both transport improvements and big investment on the horizon, making it one to watch.

It’s already a good option for people working in the City because of its 23-minute rail links to Liverpool Street, with the annual cost for a season ticket £1,400.

Goodmayes Primary School and Mayespark Primary School are rated “good” by Ofsted. For seniors the closest option is Chadwell Heath Academy, which has an “outstanding” Ofsted report and excellent GCSE results, even though half its pupils don’t have English as their first language.

Why Goodmayes is tipped as one to watch in 2020

Goodmayes will be on the Crossrail line, with direct services to the West End and west London on the cards in 2021.

Weston Homes is planning a major development of almost 1,300 new homes on a site currently occupied by a Tesco superstore, of which a third will be affordable and aimed at first-time buyers. There will also be a new primary school, shops and cafes, and landscaped grounds. A decision on the planning application is expected this year and could be a game changer for the area.

The pros: lots of bang for your property buck. Goodmayes Park has got a lake, basketball and tennis courts.

The cons: there’s nothing really wrong with it, but Goodmayes lacks a heart: traffic-clogged Goodmayes Road, while perfectly serviceable as an everyday high street, doesn’t provide one.

Average house prices in Goodmayes — and what there is to buy

Average prices in RM6 stand at £364,000, up from £263,000 five years ago – an increase of almost 40 per cent.

As yet there aren’t many flats in the area but it is a good hunting ground for houses. A four-bedroom terrace house would cost anywhere between £650,000 to £800,000.

A three-bedroom Thirties semi would cost around £400,000 to 450,000.

Blackhorse Road, north-east London

Blackhorse Road has good Zone 3 transport links, with the Victoria line and London Overground (Alamy Stock Photo)

Waltham Forest is one of London’s best-performing boroughs of the past 10 years, and this unassuming swathe of workers’ cottages, old factories and workshops is starting to emerge as a real alternative to trendy Walthamstow.

The council’s masterplan for Blackhorse Road is not only to oversee the creation of 2,500 new homes – developers are rushing to invest – but also to attract a new generation of makers, designers, artists and start-up entrepreneurs to breathe life into the area. To this end, the authority is insisting that new developments include workspaces and studios.

Blackhorse Road already possesses good Zone 3 transport links, with the Victoria line and London Overground. Schools include Hillyfield Primary Academy and St Patrick’s Primary Academy, which both hold “good” Ofsted reports, and Eden Girls’ School Waltham Forest (seniors), rated “outstanding” by the schools watchdog.

Why Blackhorse Road is tipped as one to watch in 2020

Blackhorse Road is changing, swiftly and for the better. Barratt London, London & Quadrant and Transport for London started work last summer on Blackhorse View, with 350 new homes of which half will be affordable and aimed at first-time buyers, plus 17,000sq ft of shops and workspace to a design by RMA Architects.

Design standards are generally looking high across Blackhorse Road: housing associations Catalyst and Swan are using CF Møller, the firm which designed phase two of the Darwin Centre at the Natural History Museum, to build 330 lower-cost homes on the former Webbs Industrial Estate.

The pros: Walthamstow Wetlands, London’s fantastic new nature reserve created around a series of Victorian reservoirs, is just to the west of Blackhorse Road.

The cons: a lack of much to do in terms of shops, bars and restaurants.

Average house prices in Blackhorse Road — and what there is to buy

Blackhorse Road is in E17 where average prices stand at £484,000 according to Rightmove, up from £378,000 five years ago.

The streets around Blackhorse Road Tube station are lined with neat terrace houses, originally built for local factory workers. A three-bedroom house would cost £500,000 to £550,000.

At Taylor Wimpey’s Eclipse development (taylorwimpey.co.uk) buyers could opt for a new flat, priced from £329,000 for a studio and with London Help to Buy available.

Mitcham, south London

MitchamCommon is bigger than Hyde Park, offering 460 acres of green space which stretches from the town centre to the edge of Croydon (AlamyStock Photo)

Pleasant, leafy and – to be brutally honest – rather dull, this outpost of south London is nevertheless a safe option for first-time buyers and families alike.

Its popularity stems from its affordability and good transport links. It is also earmarked for serious investment in new homes and new facilities to replace run-down council estates.

Trains from Zone 3 Mitcham Eastfields and Zone 4 Mitcham Junction will get you to Victoria in around 20 minutes, or Blackfriars in less than half an hour.

Local primary schools get an almost clean sweep of “good” reports from Ofsted, and there is a very large choice. For seniors, Harris Academy Morden is considered “outstanding” by the schools watchdog.

Why Mitcham is tipped as one to watch in 2020

Housing association Clarion is leading the £1.3 billion regeneration of three shabby post-war former council estates in the area, providing 2,800 new homes for council tenants, shared owners, renters and for private sale. There will also be new shops, leisure facilities and open spaces

The pros: the 460-acre Mitcham Common is bigger than Hyde Park.

The cons: the town centre is a boring backwater badly in need of investment. Merton council is actively seeking a developer to breathe new life into it.

Average house prices in Mitcham — and what there is to buy

Buyers are moving to Mitcham from more expensive areas including Streatham and Tooting. The average price in CR4 is £394,000, up from £281,000 five years ago according to Rightmove, a paper profit of well over £110,000.

For families a three- to four-bedroom terrace house, either Thirties or Victorian and in good condition, would cost £500,000 to £650,000. The closer to Peckham the higher the price.

There are also maisonettes priced £300,000 to £350,000 for a two-bedroom property.

At Redrow’s Millfields development (redrow.co.uk) fans of new homes could pick up a three-bedroom townhouse by the River Wandle and set in landscaped gardens, from £580,000. London Help to Buy is available.

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worldnews2day · 2 years

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The most 21 haunted places in NYC at 2022

The most 21 haunted places in NYC at 20221. Merchant’s House Museum: Once owned by the Tredwell family, this historic Noho townhouse apparently seems to have one member still living here. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com2. Morris-Jumel Mansion: Manhattan’s oldest remaining house has seen a lot of activity—from being George Washington’s temporary Revolutionary War HQ to the locations where Lin-Manuel Miranda’s busted out Hamilton rhymes. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com3. McCarren Park Pool: Apparently, this public pool in Greenpoint is tied to folklore involving a small girl who may have drowned on-site. According to Paranormal NYC, this child has been seen roaming the area at night and screaming out for help. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com4. White Horse Tavern: A wordsmith’s watering hole, this circa 1880 bar was quite the writer’s hangout in the early 1950s. Yet one regular took his status here too far. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com5. One if by Land, Two if by Sea: Aaron Burr is back again: This uber-romantic restaurant in the West Village was once the former VP’s carriage house. He and his daughter, Theodosia, are presumed to be among the spirits causing the waitstaff some havoc. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com6. The former Astor Room: Hollywood legends may still be thriving at this former commissary within Kaufman Astoria Studios. The Astoria café was a hangout for 1920s matinee idol Rudolph Valentino, Image & Story Credit: timeout.com7. The Ear Inn: When it opened in 1830, the historic Ear Inn was popular with colorful characters ambling in from the docks of the Hudson. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com8. Landmark Tavern: This waterfront Irish saloon dating back to 1868 has seen dockworkers and seamen come and go over time; it also had one of its floors operating as a Prohibition speakeasy. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com9. The Octagon on Roosevelt Island: Before being rebuilt as upscale high-rise, this rotunda has a spooky past as part of the New York City Lunatic Asylum from 1841 through 1894. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com10. House of Death: This Greenwich Village brownstone along West 10th Street has witnessed much sorrow, with reportedly many mysterious tenant deaths occurring here. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com11. Algonquin Hotel: While the management officially says no, it’s quite possible that the members of the Vicious Circle who once met regularly for lunch at this hotel have made their presence literally known. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com12. New Amsterdam Theatre: While Aladdin has been gracing the main stage, this playhouse has another active performer within its wings: a onetime Ziegfeld Follies chorus girl named Olive Thomas. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com13. 85 West 3rd Street: In 1845 and ’46, this location (now an NYU building) was the home of Edgar Allan Poe, who penned parts of his opus “The Raven” there. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com14. Billop Conference House: In the late 1700s, British loyalist Christopher Billop, then the owner of this 1680 stone homestead, allegedly killed a female servant suspected of spying for the Patriots. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com15. The Dakota: It's one of the most famous apartment buildings in New York City and possibly one of the most haunted. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com16. Washington Square Park: This famed cultural hot spot was built over a mass burial ground, where as many as 20,000 bodies, including victims of the 19th-century yellow-fever epidemic, resided. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com17. St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery: Locals claim this place of worship is a hotbed for ghosts, including that of Peter Stuyvesant, whose remains are buried in the churchyard. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com18. Hotel Chelsea: This artists’ hangout is well-known for providing lodging to rock stars and cultural celebrities over the years. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com19. Manhattan Murder Well: In 1799, the slain body of Gulielma Elmore Sands was discovered in a well just north of Spring Street. (Her suitor, Levi Weeks, was suspected of the crime but acquitted.) Image & Story Credit: timeout.com20. Hell Gate Bridge: Is it safe to assume that any landmark dubbed “Hell Gate” is haunted? Not necessarily, but many urban legends and countless ghost stories about the bridge spanning the East River between Queens and Ward’s Island have certainly scared the bejesus out of New Yorkers for many years. Image & Story Credit: timeout.com21. Belasco Theatre: This midtown landmark is not only notable for the talent it draws, but for the ghosts that never leave (gulp). Allegedly, owner David Belasco once lived in an apartment above the theatre with his right-hand lady Image & Story Credit: timeout.comVampires found at New Orleans and Atlanta?Halloween Party New York 2022Read More Visit... www.worldnews2day.com Read the full article

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nightmare-afton-cosplay · 5 years

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Fashion Designer Marc Jacobs Lists Stylish West Village Town House for $15.9M

ANGELA WEISS/AFP/Getty Images

Fashion designer Marc Jacobs has listed his chic West Village town house for $15.9 million, Variety reports.

The designer purchased the property in 2009 as raw space for almost $10.5 million. He then tapped André Tchelistcheff, and interior designers Paul Fortune, John Gachot, and Thad Hayes to finish it out. Transformed, the four-story oasis is extolled as a “stylish living and entertaining space,” and showcases the owner’s extensive art collection.

A feast for the eyes, the three-bedroom layout features an oak-paneled family room with glass doors leading out to the courtyard.

A large living and dining area offers floor-to-ceiling windows, and there’s a sleek galley kitchen as well as an office. An additional 1,462 square feet of idyllic outdoor space includes a private garden and a roof deck. The four floors are connected by elevator and stairs.

Not surprisingly, the stylish spot caught the eye of Architectural Digest. “Impeccably composed and curated, the four-floor Greenwich Village town house evokes the air of old-school chic,” the publication noted.

Living and dining space of Marc Jacobs’ town house

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Family room opens to the garden courtyard

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Sleek galley kitchen

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Master suite

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Private garden

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The town house is part of the celeb-filled Superior Ink complex, designed by the architect Robert A. M. Stern. The project includes 50 condos and seven town houses, all on the site of the former Superior Ink factory.

In addition to the posh abode, a new owner will have access to the building’s high-end amenities, including a 24-hour door attendant and concierge, a gym, a garage, and storage space.

Completed in 2009, the 17-story building has been a celebrity magnet. Along with Jacobs, A-list residents include the actress Hilary Swank, who snagged the $31.5 million penthouse. Other celeb owners include Kings of Leon band member Caleb Followill and his wife, Lily Aldridge, as well as NASCAR star Jimmie Johnson.

By the way, lower-priced units are available in the building. Check out this luxe, one-bed, one-bath for $2.7 million, with views of the Empire State Building.

Along with the well-appointed residences, the prime location is also a draw. Enjoy proximity to the popular High Line elevated park, and the shops and restaurants in the Meatpacking District. The address is also just across from the Hudson River and Chelsea Piers.

Along with creating a dream home, Jacobs is head of his high-end, self-named fashion label. He is newly married to Charly Defrancesco, and the couple have changed their focus to a $9 million Frank Lloyd Wright home in Rye, NY, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Chris Poore holds the listing.

The post Fashion Designer Marc Jacobs Lists Stylish West Village Town House for $15.9M appeared first on Real Estate News & Insights | realtor.com®.

from https://www.realtor.com/news/celebrity-real-estate/marc-jacobs-selling-stylish-west-village-townhouse/

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grabtee · 5 years

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Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt

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Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt

The Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt brick townhouse in Greenwich Village where Beard once lived is a showplace for chefs looking for validation from the foundation that runs it. But it’s a notoriously stressful place to cook. The kitchen is hot and small, with limited access for prepping food. If you screw up in front of the influential guests, a shot at a national reputation can be dashed before dessert is served.

Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt Hoodie, Sweatshirt, Longlived

Their friend, the Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt of Miller Union restaurant in Atlanta, had to knock out 80 servings each of sautéed quail and braised oxtail crépinette, delicate dishes that can overcook in a minute. So he enlisted help from three of the best catering cooks in the city. As the Lee brothers watched, they unzipped their backpacks, unrolled the dish towels that held their knives and attacked the kitchen like Navy SEALs swarming a ship commandeered by Somali pirates

Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt Hoodie, Sweatshirt, Longlived

They went undercover as catering cooks, and their dive into the Vintage Nipsey Hussle last tweet picture victory lap shirt of mercenaries who work the fanciest parties in town has produced the new book “Hotbox: Inside Catering, the Food World’s Riskiest Business” (Henry Holt & Company, 2019). It’s a revelatory, detail-rich and often breathless examination of a cutthroat world where the demanding clients include billionaires and celebrity brides but the cooking conditions resemble a mobile Army hospital.

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sserpicko · 5 years

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‘If Beale Street Could Talk’ Offers a Tour of a Lost New York

The film, directed by Barry Jenkins and nominated for three Academy Awards, was adapted from the 1974 James Baldwin novel and shot largely on the city’s streets.

If you ask even a longtime New Yorker for directions to Minetta Lane, you will likely be met with a blank stare.

The quaint one-way street, nestled in the heart of Manhattan’s Greenwich Village between Sixth Avenue and Macdougal Street, is only a few blocks from the wonderfully frenetic Washington Square Park, but it remains largely unknown. Still, it feels timeless.

For Barry Jenkins, director of the film “If Beale Street Could Talk,” which was adapted from the 1974 James Baldwin novel and tells the story of love and injustice in 1970s New York, largely in the African-American cultural mecca of Harlem and what was then a more rough-and-tumble Greenwich Village, capturing the New York City of yesteryear was paramount.

“I knew this was going to be an intimate film,” Mr. Jenkins said in a recent interview. “This is a period piece about New York. It’s James Baldwin’s sometimes acrimonious love letter to New York, but a love letter nonetheless.”

New York has, of course, changed dramatically since the 1970s. Local institutions like B. Altman and Horn & Hardart are no longer part of the landscape. Entire neighborhoods have become denser and more vertical. However, on foot, remnants of the past still stick out, providing a sensory overload that is distinctly New York.

While many of the rough spots in Greenwich Village have been smoothed out over the years, many scenes in the film were still shot there, and other neighborhoods — within walking distance or an easy subway ride away — were able to stand in. Throughout the city, narrow streets, urban parks and restaurants that have seen better days give a sense of the time and place that the novel and the movie sought to convey.

To visually reflect the richness of Baldwin’s prose, Mr. Jenkins worked closely with the film’s production designer, Mark Friedberg, and Samson Jacobson, the locations manager, both native New Yorkers.

“I leaned on those guys to not only try and find what places are organically part of the world of our characters, but also are New York, in all caps,” Mr. Jenkins said.

In the film, a pivotal scene between main characters Tish (KiKi Layne) and Fonny (Stephan James) at the intersection of Minetta Lane and Minetta Street, reflected such a sentiment and revealed New York as a place of promise, despite the many obstacles that both characters would soon face.

“The Minetta scene was interesting because it was pouring rain,” Mr. Jenkins said. “This wasn’t our intention in the script, but on the day of filming these two young black actors who are unfamiliar to many people were just walking down the block on the night of essentially their first love and the skies have opened. It’s so picturesque, like 1950s Hollywood Americana.”

If you visit Greenwich Village now, you’ll see a mishmash of boutiques and local restaurants, especially on the side streets like Charles Street and Greenwich Avenue, roads that don’t adhere to the uniform Manhattan street grid. Longtime music haunts like Village Vanguard and the Bitter End remain.

In the novel, Greenwich Village is richly narrated in Tish’s voice, who observes not only the layout of Washington Square Park, but the eclectic people who have defined its existence.

“We passed Minetta Tavern, crossed Minetta Lane, passed the newspaper stand on the next corner, and crossed diagonally into the park, which seemed to huddle in the shadow of the heavy new buildings of N.Y.U. and the high new apartment buildings on the east and the north. We passed the men who had been playing chess in the lamplight for generations, and people walking their dogs, and young men with bright hair and very tight pants, who looked quickly at Fonny and resignedly at me. We sat down on the stone edge of the dry fountain, facing the arch.”

Fonny tells Tish that he used to occasionally sleep in the park. Filming for the Washington Square Park scenes actually took place at Stuyvesant Square Park near the Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village development on the East Side of Manhattan.

Washington Square Park, with its 1892 triumphal arch, remains a magnet for chess players and social activism. Its large size allows it to thrive as a universal meeting place of sorts, while Stuyvesant Square Park, located between East 15th and East 17th Streets and bisected by Second Avenue, is a much smaller park.

“Washington Square Park doesn’t look at all like their Washington Square Park,” Mr. Friedberg said. “It looks like Versailles right now compared to the Washington Square Park that Fonny slept in. We ended up shooting in Stuyvesant park, which was also nice, but had the old benches and wrought iron.”

Tish, who was employed in a department store, worked tirelessly through her pregnancy. Bergdorf Goodman, the luxury retailer on Fifth Avenue and 57th Street, allowed scenes to be filmed in their store, but with a caveat.

“They were really cool about us shooting there, but we had to get there when they closed and be out of there before they opened,” Mr. Friedberg said.

After a lot of prodding, Mr. Friedberg was able to film in El Quijote, the Spanish restaurant at the Hotel Chelsea which operated for 88 years before it closed last year. (There are tentative plans for the restaurant, at 226 West 23rd Street in the Chelsea neighborhood, to reopen after a renovation.) In the film, El Quijote stood in for El Faro, a long-gone Spanish restaurant that was located at the corner of Greenwich and Horatio streets in Greenwich Village.

Fonny has a basement apartment on Bank Street in the West Village, which was extensively designed by Mr. Friedberg on a sound stage to resemble an older apartment, complete with a bathtub in the kitchen. In the novel, Tish is accosted at a market on Bleecker Street by a deranged man, which resulted in Fonny defending her and subsequently being framed for rape by a racist police officer; the filming for those dramatic scenes was completed on location in the Bronx.

On Arthur Avenue, the “Little Italy” of the Bronx, located south of Fordham Road, a few minutes from the Fordham Road station (B and D lines) and the Fordham Metro North station, excellent pizzerias, delis and bakeries remain a way of life. It is a perfect stand-in for 1960s-era Greenwich Village.

“The area still has the last bit of its Italian commercial culture,” Mr. Friedberg said. “Also, like Greenwich Village, the streets don’t perfectly line up in that area.”

From 1958 to 1961, Baldwin himself lived in an apartment at 81 Horatio Street in Greenwich Village. However, he was born and raised in Harlem, the cultural nexus of the novel and the film. (From Greenwich Village, Harlem is an easy ride uptown on the New York City subway, with express service on the A and No. 2 and 3 lines and the 125th Street stations serving as gateways to the heart of the neighborhood.)

Tish and Fonny first meet as children in Harlem. On film, we see them as adults, walking in Riverside Park, with the Hudson River and the sounds of the Henry Hudson Parkway in the distance. When Tish finds out that she is pregnant and is comforted by her mother, Sharon Rivers (Regina King), her family invites Fonny’s family to their apartment to tell them the news about the impending baby. The apartment scenes were filmed on location in Harlem, in a townhouse near St. Nicholas Park, which runs alongside St. Nicholas Avenue from West 128th to West 141st Streets.

When Daniel Carty (Brian Tyree Henry) runs into Fonny on Lenox Avenue near 123rd Street, it feels like a family reunion of sorts; it goes back to the theme of Harlem as this unifying force for African-Americans. They were in a neighborhood filled with brownstones and grand avenues that also produced Baldwin and was at the heart of the Harlem Renaissance. While Harlem experienced a high level of urban decay in the 1970s, which Baldwin details, it still is seen as a force more positive than not throughout the film.

Reflecting on some of the most memorable film locations in the city, Mr. Jenkins honed in on the Showmans Jazz Club on 125th Street near Convent Avenue in Harlem, which featured a scene with Joseph Rivers (Colman Domingo) and Frank Hunt (Michael Beach), two fathers sitting at a bar, trying to figure out how to save Fonny from a jail sentence. The bar impressed Mr. Jenkins during the film preproduction, and made it into the film.

“Showmans is a place where I would go to unwind if I lived in the neighborhood,” he said. “It’s one of my favorite Harlem locations because it’s still there. The essence and spirit of your work really comes alive when you can get a lot of the city into a film.”

John L. Dorman: nytimes.com

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