Jim Dykes New York City Tours Blog

 Here's a random selection of Christmas pictures from 2023...just for fun. Bryant Park, Rock Center, SAKS Fifth Ave,, Radio City Christmas Show, Macy's, Times Sq, Grand Central, Wall Street, Washington Square, various trees.

 Spring in New York is full of school groups from all over-- East coast, west coast, midwest, south! Here are some of my happy groups at Grand Central, in Central Park and on the bus touring, St. Patrick's, the Little Island, FLAT STANLEY in the subway, etc.

 New York's dull, grey, concrete streets come alive in the Spring when the flowers and trees bloom and the fountains are turned on one by one. It adds just a bit of color to a city emerging from winter. The last few years, many hotels, stores and even churches are investing in large floral displays at their entrances. In many cases these flowers are not real but are beautiful and life-like nonetheless. For example St. Patrick's Cathedral joins the splendor of the Easter Parade and the annual St. Patrick's Parade by festooning the Cathedral's entrance with floral tributes. Last year they were a multi-colored flower display but this year's flower are all white artifucial lilies and roses and tend to go nicely with the real flowers inside the altar as well as outside decorating Rockefeller Center's gardens across Fifth Avenue. Also, the ice skating rink has been removed for the warm weather and the sunken plaza is now an open-air plaza to stroll and order food or t

  Another great example of air rights! A skyscraper is cantilevered over a historic building that sold their air rights. In a city like New York air rights are a big deal. There are law firms that do almost nothing but negotiate "air rights." It started in the late 1800s/early 1900s...people loved their views from the new skyscrapers but what happens when you suddenly lose your view because some a-hole builds a tower next door? Zoning laws were enacted to create air rights...all over Manhattan I can show you buildings like this that were built over or around. Small buildings like this are called real estate "holdouts" but historic buildings like mansions, theatres, churches can all sell their air rights and make fortunes doing it. The Vanderbilts owned Grand Central and the New York Central Railroad and all the railroad yards in and out of Grand Central. They created Park Avenue in the air rights over the 2-level train tracks and sold the air rights to developers wh

HBO's THE GILDED AGE is a popular show and has awakened many people to that period of extravagance in late 19th century-early 20th century. Many scenes were filmed at the grand homes in Newport, Rhode Island, which were built during the "gilded age" as summer houses for the New York wealthy including the Astors, the Vanderbilts and many others. Many are now museums. Rosecliff is my favorite  "Gilded Age" mansion....the home of silver heiress Theresa Fair (later Mrs. Hermann Oelrichs). Theresa (Tessie) grew up in a mining town in Nevada but after her father struck his silver lode and became fabulously wealthy, she adapted to life as a wealthy woman easily. She was known for her kindness, natural class and common sense. Designed by Stanford White for the lovely Theresa, Rosecliff is best visited in May/June when the gardens that surround the home are in bloom. Attached to each chandelier, notice the small clear crystals at the bottom. Theresa had these filled with

  ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING location As a New York City private tour guide over the years, people always want to see their favorite movie & TV locations because New York is full of them. In this blog I’ll mention many of them from the “Carrie Bradshaw” brownstone in SEX & THE CITY, to the white marble mansion on WHITE COLLAR to many other locations. ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING is a television show produced for HULU and most was recently viewed on ABC and it's a quirky mystery/comedy entering its 4 th season. It’s about a group of neighbors doing a true crime podcast in their Upper West side luxury apartment building dubbed The Arconia- and they actually stumble onto various murders and assorted crimes in their building!  It stars Steve Martin (also a producer), Martin Short and the youngest Selena Gomez as a very unlikely group of curious neighbors. Lately this is the building every tourist asks about…I’ve had tourists from South Carolina, Texas and most recently