2022
Open House New York Weekend
There'll come a time I'll want to know I was here
Only two years out from the pandemic and I’m already missing out on most of this year’s Open House New York Weekend due to what could be described as a family emergency and, for now at least, I’m leaving it at that. Still it was actually good to be out, even if only for a little while, as I focused all my attention on a single downtown site. On the way I went through Fulton Street Transit Center, where it remains impossible (for me at least) to not stop and look up and take yet another picture of that just about picture perfect view under the oculus.
The one Open House New York site that I visited was the Red Room, the lobby of One Wall Street, a landmark Ralph Walker office building that is being converted into residential units.
The Red Room visit was really a timed presentation, and to get tickets you needed an advance registration. Initially Open House New York reservations were easy to get, but as time passed and the event grew more popular, reservation day was a futile and frustrating joke. OHNY would offer like twenty tickets for an amazing experience that like 20,000 people tried to get at the same time. Almost instantly their site would freeze and everything would be gone. It got so bad that I started not even trying anymore after a few years passed where I was shut out of everything. What saved me this year was that lots of capacity for this tour was available and, more importantly, OHNY started a far more fair lottery type system instead of the mad rush free for all they used to have.
After all these pictures, I’m finally getting around to why the red room is called the red room, even though a lot of orange is involved. The walls are covered with some pretty spectacular murals by Hildreth Meière, and even though these photos came out pretty good, they look even better in person.
Keep going back in time. Open House New York 2021 is next.
