By TOM TOPOUSIS
June 18, 2008
A new proposal for a luxury residential building above the former Parke-Bernet Galleries on the Upper East Side got a far better reception yesterday than an earlier plan to build a soaring tower over the Madison Avenue structure.
In other words, not everyone hated it.
Developer Aby Rosen unveiled his latest plan - for a four-story addition, clad in a bronze louvered skin, above the building's original four stories of limestone - at the corner of 76th Street during a Landmarks Preservation Commission public hearing.
One critic, author Tom Wolfe, an Upper East side resident, called the project designed by world-renowned British architect Norman Foster out of place. "I would urge Mr. Foster to start exploring forms other than a glass box," Wolfe said.
