Image via Google Street View
With a legendary tenants’ rights lawyer on board, a longtime leaseholder is standing fast against a developer’s ‘dream tower’ plans, claiming their business has a valid lease and is being wrongfully evicted, according to the New York Times. Irving and Samuel Morano, the antiques dealers who own Metropolitan Fine Arts and Antiques, are the largest remaining tenant at 10 West 57th Street, a prime location opposite Bergdorf Goodman. 89-year-old developer Sheldon Solow has been amassing properties along the “Billionaire’s Row” strip, where the Solow Building, his office tower at 9 West 57th Street stands, since 1977. With grand plans in place to erect a sleek Skidmore Owings & Merrill-designed 54-story hotel and condominium tower, Solow has evicted tenants, erected scaffolding and started demolition on one of the properties along the strip.
