The American Folk Art Museum plans to continue operating at its 2 Lincoln Square location thanks to financial help from trustees and the Ford Foundation, the New York Times reported. “We are confident that we’re embarking on a prudent course with the facilities that we have and the staff that we have,” Edward Blanchard, who was elected the museum’s new president yesterday, said. “I think we’re going to do some very exciting things.” Blanchard declined to specify the dollar amount of the donations.

Earlier this year, the Folk Art Museum had to move from a large renovated space at 45 West 53rd Street after it defaulted on construction bonds. [more]

From left: the American Folk Art Museum and the adjacent Museum of Modern Art

The sale of the American Folk Art Museum building at 45 West 53rd Street to the Museum of Modern Art hit public records yesterday, confirming earlier reports that the transaction closed for $31.2 million. The deal was filed with the city July 22.

The folk art museum’s building was designed by Tod Williams Billie Tsie Architects and opened in 2001 next door to MoMA’s space. The folk art museum took out a $32 million loan to construct the building, but weak visitor numbers and the economic downturn put a strain on the museum’s financials. – Adam Fusfeld [more]

From left: 45 West 53rd Street and 2 Lincoln Square (building credit: PropertyShark)

The American Folk Art Museum, which was forced to sell its home on West 53rd Street, will return to its other, smaller location in Lincoln Square July 9, according to Crain’s. The museum sold the building at 45 West 53rd Street that it has occupied for the past 10 years to the nearby Museum of Modern Art in May $31.2 million, to settle a $32 million debt. The new space, at 2 Lincoln Square, is considerably smaller than the 53rd Street location, but the museum is confident that it will still be able to offer a full schedule of exhibitions and programming. The Lincoln Square site was the institution’s home prior to the opening of its West 53rd Street building. It pays $1 a year in rent to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.[Crain's] [more]

The Museum of Modern Art is buying the home of its next-door neighbor, the cash-strapped American Folk Art Museum at 45 West 53rd Street, according to the New York Times.

The folk art museum’s building, which opened in 2001 and was designed by Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, sits between the current MoMA space and a vacant lot that has long been slated for additional museum development. MoMA sold that vacant lot to Hines in 2007 with the understanding that the developer would ultimately build additional gallery space there.

Owning the building in between would allow MoMA to connect the galleries, though it’s unclear whether the existing structure would be torn down. [more]

The Donnell Library site on West 53rd Street

[Updated at 10:33 p.m. with comment to The Real Deal] The aging, five-story Donnell Library on West 53rd Street is back on track to become a hotel thanks to a new contract to develop the site by Tribeca Associates and Starwood Capital. (Note: correction appended).The partnership is planning a 260,000-square-foot, $400 million project that includes condominium units, hotel rooms and space for a new library, sources told Crain’s. Orient-Express Hotels had signed onto a similar deal in 2007, under
which it agreed to buy the site from the New York Public Library for $59
million, although a spokesperson told The Real Deal “the deal is not final.” [more]

From left: Ellen Futter of the American Museum of Natural History, Thomas Campbell of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Glenn Lowry of MoMA

While the presidents of the American Museum of Natural History, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art have undoubtedly disparate backgrounds, they do share one thing in common: they all live in tax-free housing, on their employers’ dime. The history museum’s Ellen Futter enjoys a $5 million Upper East Side apartment owned by her institution, while Thomas Campbell of the Met and Glenn Lowry of MoMA live in a museum-owned $4 million co-op and a $6 million condo, respectively, according to the New York Times. These situations sometimes raise eyebrows — and questions — experts say, pushing the boundary of what constitutes a work-live abode. In order for these cultural titans to live in their employer-provided housing without taxation they must prove that they were given no other option but to live there, experts say, and that the homes provide a legitimate benefit to their career. [NYT]

[more]

The Milan-based Triennale Design Museum has signed a 15-year lease for 18,067 square feet of space at 40 West 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth avenues, to serve as the museum’s first U.S. location, according to a press release from Cushman & Wakefield, which represented Triennale. The Midtown location, across from the Museum of Modern Art, will be the third Triennale outpost worldwide — the other two are located in Tokyo and Milan. The newly leased space is expected to showcase a 10,000-square-foot exhibition area, a 3,000-square-foot café and a 3,000-square-foot museum shop. The museum is expected to open in May. TRD

Concrete in nearly 60 New York City buildings still needs to be retested, more than a year after fraud allegations emerged against one of the city’s largest testing companies, Testwell Laboratories. The Museum of Modern Art and a 40-story office building in Times Square were among the buildings that needed retesting, according to the New York Times. The retesting process is vexing the city Department of Buildings in both scale and degree of difficulty. “There is no accepted standard to retest concrete on this scale, and we have been working with more than 50 engineers associated with the buildings named in the indictment to develop a protocol to ensure all of the tests were done properly,” said department spokesperson Tony Sclafani. The city could have even more to test soon — another concrete testing company, Stallone Testing Laboratories, was formally indicted on similar charges last month. [more]

From the July issue: Sandy Lindenbaum is counsel at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel, is one of the city’s most high-profile land-use attorneys. His clients have included Carnegie Hall, Weill Cornell Medical College and the Macklowe, Silverstein and Solow organizations. He’s currently working on the expansion of the Museum of Modern Art. Lindenbaum spoke to The Real Deal about having “literally met my wife in my bed,” working with the biggest names in real estate and his knack for identifying every building in the city.

Jean Nouvel and renderings of 53 West 53rd Street

Developers of a Jean Nouvel-designed skyscraper adjacent to the Museum
of Modern Art have applied to build a tower seven stories taller than
the proposal they originally unveiled two years ago. The willowy design for the tower at 53 West 53rd Street the developer announced in the fall of 2007
was 75 stories tall, but the one included in a recent filing with the Department of City Planning and described on the developer’s Web
site is 82 stories high. The building has been controversial, with Community Board 5 criticizing
its height and bulk in a resolution in March 2008, calling it an
“eccentric, asymmetrical tower.” The mixed-use project from Houston-based international developer Hines
Interests will have 100 hotel rooms and 120 condominium units on the
upper floors, and also include a 60,000-square-foot expansion of MoMa’s
galleries on the second to the fifth floors, the Hines Web site says.
The number of hotel and condo rooms has not changed since 2007, but the
amount of space for the museum has grown from 50,000 in 2007 to 60,000, according to
the latest description on the Web site. A museum spokesperson put the figure at 70,000 square feet. Hines did not immediately respond to requests for comment. [more]