In 1929, architect Rosario Candela completed the "L" shaped cooperative apartment house, located at East 85th Street and Park Avenue, New York. While perusing my copy of the Michael Gross extravaganza "740 Park, The Story of the Worlds' Richest Apartment Building" I noticed that Mr. and Mrs. Neil Sedaka were mentioned as saying that they'd first attempted to buy into 740, but were rejected - by the board - along with Ms. Barbra Streisand. So, the Sedakas moved into a large duplex at 1021. Ms. Streisand was also rejected by the board at 1021. The Sedakas lived at 1021 for about fifteen years, before selling to Mr. and Mrs. Michael Weiner, who hired Tice Alexander, a decorator I worked with at the time, while also running my own office in North Carolina- and I remember that the Sedakas had worked with the late Robert Metzger, another designer I worked under. I helped Tice shop, design and install the apartment for the Weiners, and it turned out beautifully, very much in the Parish-Hadley mode. Sadly, the last time I was in 1021, it was to attend a memorial service for Tice. Albert and I rode down in the elevator (we both left early). Prince Michael of Greece made a beautiful speech.
Later, Tice and I designed the Weiners' country house in Connecticut, which was destroyed in a fire. Before he died, Tice asked me if I wanted to take on the project, (before the fire) but I decided to move back to Winston-Salem. So, Albert and Harry Heissman completely re-created what Tice had designed and installed, as the house was re-built exactly as it had been before the dreaded fire.
An interesting footnote, Mr. Weiner was associated with John Kluge, the owner of MetroMedia, and the large house he built near Charlottesville, which was designed by David Easton- was a project that Tice almost worked on. David Easton tried to hire Tice as the project manager for the Kluge estate, but Tice decided he would rather stay in New York, rather than move to Virginia, which is what the job would've required. Also, I do think that the money being offered was just not quite enough, perhaps another zero would have done the trick! DF
