The richest man in the universe buys Liz Taylor’s former mansion; Joan Collins moves out; saying no to Strauss-Kahn

Reliable sources say Mexican mogul Carlos Slim, the world’s wealthiest man (he’s worth an estimated $74 billion), has purchased the Felissimo townhouse at 10 West 56th Street for $15.5 million in cash. The five-story limestone mansion was also the onetime home of Elizabeth Taylor and third husband Michael Todd (NY Post).

Joan Collins—best remembered as the big-haired, big shouldered eighties icon Alexis Carrington of Dynasty—is selling her 1,900 square-foot apartment at the Dorchester at 110 East 57th Street for $2.895 million with plans to spend more time at her other homes in Los Angeles, London and the South of France (NYPost).

“No”-table neighbor: Dominique Strauss-Kahn didn’t get past the doorman at the Bristol Plaza, the Upper East Side luxury condo where his wife had rented two apartments for $14,000 a month (NYTimes). The building gave the thumbs-down to the IMF bigwig’s request to hole up there post-Rikers in order to spare residents the media circus that would undoubtedly follow. Strauss-Kahn will be bringing the circus to 71 Broadway in Lower Manhattan instead, though the new digs will apparently be temporary during the search for a building willing to put up with the high-profile perp (via Gothamist).

Designer life: French designer Alber Elbaz, artistic director of fashion house Lanvin, just bought his first New York apartment, a 2,376-square-foot one-bedroom condo in the Apthorp on the Upper West Side that was listed for $6.2 million (NYTimes). The Israeli-born designer has rented a pied-à-terre in the city since his move to Paris in 1996.

In other news, Super Size Me director Morgan Spurlock is house-hunting in Park Slope, where the doc director and his wife, a vegan chef, should fit right in (New York Magazine); Justin Timberlake has found a buyer for his Tribeca condo in the Pearline Soap Factory (CurbedNY).