California private equity firm CIM Group, which paid off lenders to take control of Harry Macklowe's former Drake Hotel site at Park Avenue and 56th Street for $305 million, has acquired an additional property adjacent to the assemblage, according to an article by Adam Pincus today at therealdeal.com.
"The CIM Group paid $42.5 million for the 18-foot-wide, five-story townhouse at 46 East 57th Street, city records filed yesterday show. The California company picked up the five-story, 57th Street property through six separate deeds, with values between $417,057 and $14.2 million, city records show," the article said.
A spokesperson for CIM Group declined to comment, other than to confirm the sale price.
Mr. Macklowe bought the Drake Hotel at 434 Park Avenue in 2006 for $418 million and the next year tore it down with plans to rebuild a hotel, residential and commercial development. He acquired four properties on 57th Street to give the site frontage on the high-profile street.
Subsequently, however, Mr. Macklowe defaulted on the project's loans, and Deutsche Bank representing a group of lenders filed to foreclose in August 2008.
"CIM Group took over the site in January 2010, but real estate insiders say Macklowe is still involved in the project today," the article said, adding that "according to property records and foreclosure filings, by 2008 Macklowe controlled 38, 40, 44 and 50 East 57th Street, but not 42, 46 and 48 East 57th Street. This new addition widens access on the street, but property records indicate CIM Group still does not control 42 and 48 East 57th Street, preventing a new development from building a cohesive street wall on the block."
The 21-story, 495-room Drake Hotel had been erected in 1926 by Bing & Bing and designed by Emery Roth.
"In the early 1960's entrepreneur William Zeckendorf acquired the hotel, added guest rooms and opened New York's first discotheque, Shepheard's. In 1965, the Tisch brothers, acquired the property" according to Stanley Turkel, who had been hired by the Tisch organization to be the first general manager of Loews.
"We printed and distributed a card entitled, 'How to Do the Newest Discotheque Dances at Shepheard's in New York's Drake Hotel' with step-by-step instructions to dance the Jerk, Watusi, Frug and the Monkey. Killer Joe Piro's party was a regular feature at Shepheard's. The discotheque was so successful that patrons lined up on 56th Street and around the corner on Park Avenue to wait (even on the winter's coldest nights) to be admitted where they paid a hefty cover charge to dance to disco music," Mr. Turkel wrote.
"The Drake's guest list included such famous classical musicians as Alicia del la Rocha, Dame Myra Hess and Glenn Gould. Also celebrities like Milton Berle, Leon Bibb, Paul Anka, Muhammed Ali (soft spoken and kind), Barry Goldwater and many more," Mr. Turkel recalled.
The hotel was acquired in the early 1980s by the Swissotel company of Zurich, which undertook a $52 million room-by-room renovation of the building. Renovations were completed in 1991.
Silent film star Lillian Gish lived at the hotel from 1946-1949. Other notable guests included Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Glenn Gould and Toots Shor.
It was as demolished in 2007.
CIM has become very active in Manhattan as it recently agreed to pay down about $85 million of senior debt held by iStar financial for the hotel-condo Trump Soho, purchased the loan for 209 unsold condo units at William Beaver House, a 47-story residential tower in the financial district, and took an undisclosed stake in 11 Madison Avenue, an art deco office building that is the U.S. home of Credit Suisse. All those deals involved the Sapir Organization.
A May 20, 1964 article in Time magazine said that "the place to shoehorn into at the moment is Shepheard's, a fantasia of golden Pharaohs, gilded sphinxes, palm trees and desert tents, which is supposed to suggest the famed old outpost of empire in Cairo that burned down in 1952."
"The CIM Group paid $42.5 million for the 18-foot-wide, five-story townhouse at 46 East 57th Street, city records filed yesterday show. The California company picked up the five-story, 57th Street property through six separate deeds, with values between $417,057 and $14.2 million, city records show," the article said.
A spokesperson for CIM Group declined to comment, other than to confirm the sale price.
Mr. Macklowe bought the Drake Hotel at 434 Park Avenue in 2006 for $418 million and the next year tore it down with plans to rebuild a hotel, residential and commercial development. He acquired four properties on 57th Street to give the site frontage on the high-profile street.
Subsequently, however, Mr. Macklowe defaulted on the project's loans, and Deutsche Bank representing a group of lenders filed to foreclose in August 2008.
"CIM Group took over the site in January 2010, but real estate insiders say Macklowe is still involved in the project today," the article said, adding that "according to property records and foreclosure filings, by 2008 Macklowe controlled 38, 40, 44 and 50 East 57th Street, but not 42, 46 and 48 East 57th Street. This new addition widens access on the street, but property records indicate CIM Group still does not control 42 and 48 East 57th Street, preventing a new development from building a cohesive street wall on the block."
The 21-story, 495-room Drake Hotel had been erected in 1926 by Bing & Bing and designed by Emery Roth.
"In the early 1960's entrepreneur William Zeckendorf acquired the hotel, added guest rooms and opened New York's first discotheque, Shepheard's. In 1965, the Tisch brothers, acquired the property" according to Stanley Turkel, who had been hired by the Tisch organization to be the first general manager of Loews.
"We printed and distributed a card entitled, 'How to Do the Newest Discotheque Dances at Shepheard's in New York's Drake Hotel' with step-by-step instructions to dance the Jerk, Watusi, Frug and the Monkey. Killer Joe Piro's party was a regular feature at Shepheard's. The discotheque was so successful that patrons lined up on 56th Street and around the corner on Park Avenue to wait (even on the winter's coldest nights) to be admitted where they paid a hefty cover charge to dance to disco music," Mr. Turkel wrote.
"The Drake's guest list included such famous classical musicians as Alicia del la Rocha, Dame Myra Hess and Glenn Gould. Also celebrities like Milton Berle, Leon Bibb, Paul Anka, Muhammed Ali (soft spoken and kind), Barry Goldwater and many more," Mr. Turkel recalled.
The hotel was acquired in the early 1980s by the Swissotel company of Zurich, which undertook a $52 million room-by-room renovation of the building. Renovations were completed in 1991.
Silent film star Lillian Gish lived at the hotel from 1946-1949. Other notable guests included Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Glenn Gould and Toots Shor.
It was as demolished in 2007.
CIM has become very active in Manhattan as it recently agreed to pay down about $85 million of senior debt held by iStar financial for the hotel-condo Trump Soho, purchased the loan for 209 unsold condo units at William Beaver House, a 47-story residential tower in the financial district, and took an undisclosed stake in 11 Madison Avenue, an art deco office building that is the U.S. home of Credit Suisse. All those deals involved the Sapir Organization.
A May 20, 1964 article in Time magazine said that "the place to shoehorn into at the moment is Shepheard's, a fantasia of golden Pharaohs, gilded sphinxes, palm trees and desert tents, which is supposed to suggest the famed old outpost of empire in Cairo that burned down in 1952."
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
6sqft delivers the latest on real estate, architecture, and design, straight from New York City.
