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On a balmy Wednesday evening two years ago, three businessmen sat down for a dinner meeting in the Fortuny-silk-upholstered dining room of New York's Hotel Carlyle. One guest, half-jokingly, commented that he hoped the meeting could wind up by 10 because he wanted to watch the season's concluding segment of "Twin Peaks."
One of the dining room's staff must have overheard him. As the hour approached, and it became clear that the meeting would last much longer than 10, one of the hotel's assistant managers approached the table. "Excuse me, sir," he said, "but I've taken the liberty of inserting a blank tape in the VCR in your room and setting it for 10 o'clock on ABC. So you can watch `Twin Peaks' at your leisure." This is obviously not the sort of service one would expect at an ordinary hotel. But the last thing the Carlyle has ever wanted to be is ordinary.
For nearly 60 years, the 38-floor, 426-foot-high Carlyle-with its sleek Art Deco lines and graceful tower (that doubles as a smokestack to accommodate wood-burning fireplaces in some of the grander suites)-has dominated the skyline of Manhattan's Upper East Side. Because it soars above its shorter neighbors, the upper floors of the hotel command breathtaking views of the city in all directions, including Central Park. (The hotel, at Madison Avenue and 76th Street, is one block east of 5th Avenue, which forms the park's eastern boundary.) In fact, the Carlyle's residents (there are 74 co-op apartments in the building, in addition to 183 hotel rooms and suites) feel that theirs is a better address than one on 5th Avenue, since they are spared nuisances that 5th Avenue dwellers complain about-the pungent odors that occasionally waft upward from Central Park Zoo and the periodic noisy, messy parades.
The hotel has always been something of an anomaly. Its construction in 1930 and 1931 was thought to be ill-timed. The nation was sliding into the Great Depression, and the market for luxury hotel rooms and apartments had already shrunk disastrously. Still, its builders blithely ignored hard times and spared no expense-bedrooms and bathrooms (some with views of the park) are oversize-and sacrificed rentable space in order to provide, on the tower's setbacks, rooms with...