It has been whispered about for months, but now it’s official: Vornado Realty Trust is offering up a palatial four-floor apartment at 220 Central Park South that is priced at a record-smashing $250 million.
The massive condominium will encompass floors 50 through 53 of the Robert A.M. Stern-designed limestone tower, and it will span some 23,000 square feet [...]. The asking price works out to nearly $11,000 per square foot. — therealdeal.com

[Yale students:] Why do you think architecture is important, and who do you think it serves, other than the golf players? (laughter)

[Stern:] Architecture is everything about the man made environment. Some of it achieves the level of high art, some of it is good solid meat and potatoes, which is very important after all. You don’t want to sit down to a dinner of foie gras every day in the week. Sometimes you want to have bangers and mash. [...]

Architecture is an art—high and low. — yalepaprika.com

New York has seen twenty-first-century buildings in early-twentieth-century drag before, but 30 Park Place stands out, both for its size [...] and for its location—cheek-by-jowl with some of the most ambitious buildings to emerge from the current high-rise boom [...]

“We’re transposing a nineteen-thirties language to lower Manhattan, which has gotten overrun with glass and abstraction,” the architect said in a recent interview. “People want to look at buildings and make connections.” — newyorker.com

Vornado's super luxury tower at 220 Central Park South isn't even out of the ground yet, but billionaire buyers seemingly can't wait to stash their stacks of cash in the 950-foot-tall tower. The Real Deal hears rumblings that a Qatari investor is eyeing a monstrous spread that would cost around $250 million, making it easily the most expensive home in New York City. It would completely obliterate the current record, the $100 million sale at One57. — ny.curbed.com

Although money is often seen as a taboo topic in art schools, a group of Yale alumni is urging professional architects to place more value on the relationship between money and architecture.

The Yale Architectural Journal’s latest edition, titled “Money,” discusses the controversial role of money in the field of architecture. [...] ranging from Frank Gehry to Yale School of Architecture Professor Keller Easterling, the issue urges architects to reconsider the financial side of their work. — yaledailynews.com

After nearly two decades of leadership, School of Architecture Dean Robert A.M. Stern ARC ’65 is reportedly planning to step down.

Five faculty and administrative staff members at the School of Architecture said that Stern will retire from the school when his term as dean concludes in Spring 2016. Professor Michelle Addington added that he has also been a major influence on her own approach to architecture. — yaledailynews.com

A triplex penthouse at Zeckendorf Development Co.’s tower under construction on Manhattan’s Upper East Side will be offered for sale at $130 million, making it New York’s most expensive apartment listing.

The 12,394-square-foot (1,151-square-meter) property will span the top three floors at 520 Park Ave., where sales will begin the first quarter of next year, Arthur Zeckendorf said in an interview today. — bloomberg.com

Robert A.M. Stern Architects recently announced Anna Antropova, a master's degree candidate at the McGill University School of Architecture, as the recipient of the 2014 RAMSA Travel Fellowship.

The $10,000 fellowship will fund Antropova's trip to Japan, where she will study ancient wood joinery techniques. Her research focuses on the potential transformation and reintroduction of applying ancient timber techniques to modern construction. — bustler.net

It's hard not to wince when you first look at the renderings of the Mormon Church's expanding kingdom at 16th and Vine Streets, unveiled last week by Mayor Nutter. The architectural chameleons at Robert Stern's office have paired a 1920s-style apartment tower with a teensy redbrick meetinghouse that looks as if it was dragged across town from colonial-era Society Hill. — philly.com

Stern has been called the Martha Stewart of architecture, a comparison suggesting that he’s selling a lifestyle rather than making art. — nymag.com

Jonathan Dessi-Olive, a Master's candidate at the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, has recently been announced as recipient of the 2013 RAMSA Travel Fellowship. The $10,000 prize is awarded annually by the Partners of Robert A.M. Stern Architects for the purpose of travel and research. — bustler.net

Stern's architecture is always steeped in strategic references to past landmarks; there is no doubt he knows how to send, and shape, an architectural message. And the message the front entrance to the Bush Library delivers is clear: This is a building meant to honor a particularly blunt and plain-spoken kind of political power. — latimes.com

Robert A. M. Stern, the dean of Yale’s Architecture School, said he declined to sign the petition because he objected to its use of the word “demand,” but that he backed it in principle. “It would be wonderful for the Pritzker committee to review the situation and to offer her the prize,” Mr. Stern said. “The nature of the collaboration was so intense on every level.” — nytimes.com

The students were tapped in determining whether to invest in one or two clothes dryers. Would they use drying racks to eliminate the second dryer? Would they give up hair dryers? Would they wear sweaters in winter to permit an energy-saving thermostat setting of 67 degrees?

“We don’t tell students that certain behaviors are unacceptable,” said Joseph Scanio, one of the center’s two live-in teachers. “We discuss things. We make it easy to be intentional about the choices you make.” — bloomberg.com