Vladimir Kagan's Blog

Hurricane Sandy's Brutal aftermath

Hurricane Sandy Progress & Demise

Part 2 & 3

Copyright Vladimir Kagan, October 30, 2012

 

It’s Getting Serious

 Monday 29^th of October:Twelve Noon – The storm is 150 miles south of the city but the impact can now be felt all around. The trees are no long docile, their leaves are blowing off like a snowstorm. From my window, the limbs are thrashing in all directions, sucked up into the vortex of the wind that is rushing through the canyons of New York’s high-rise buildings. There was early flooding at the Battery, the southern tip of Manhattan, that is now receding, waiting for the next high tide at six this evening. The immensity of the surge combined with a full moon will guarantee water flooding this area up to seven feet above ground level. Subway entrances will serve as huge drainage holes; water cascading down staircases. The Brooklyn and Holland Tunnels will be closed as of 3 P.M., the remaining Lincoln tunnel will surely follow shortly thereafter. Bridges will be closed when wind gusts reach 60 MPH…. This will easily happen as gusts are predicted to reach 90 MPH.

The city has ground to standstill – a strange phenomena.

 

My friend Peter, greeting the water as it started to pour over the embankment on the Hudson River

Where Peter stood six hours earlier - water gushing on the footpath with the Jersey Shoreline in the backgound... before it all went dark

 The streets of Greenwich Village in downtown Manhattan at the height of the flooding

This is an exclusive! My friend Peter Bordes went out into the storm and shot this amazing YouTube video, the Hudson River overflowing into the streets of New York

The windows and doors in my apartment are noisily rattling. The girls are in the kitchen baking chocolate chip cookies (yummy). I am sitting at my desk being creative on the computer to keep you informed. The dog needs walking (a necessity regardless of the weather) and the rest of our menagerie: a bunny, a canary, and three fish, are unperturbed. All that’s missing is a fire in the fireplace (yes in pre-war apartment buildings in New York, those luxuries exist) and a friendly game of Monopoly (if we can find it).

This is the rather benign view from my window in my office - the only indication of a storm are the swaying trees far below

The view from my kitchen window (facing north) told another story 

As the windows in my living room were rattling and pulsating, the children taped the glass

A cozy dinner in the living room with a fire blazing in the fireplace

Toby not overly eager to go out

 

Devastation:

Nine P.M. (21 hours on the International system). We are in the brunt of the storm. It officially made landfall at Atlantic City, New Jersey… a stone’s throw away from New York, (geographically speaking). It has officially been downgraded to a post-tropical cyclone…. But don’t be fooled by the name… it is punching winds of 80 miles per hour. While the storm is steadily pushing northward, the wind is swirling in from the Northeast but beginning to also rattle-in from the South. The rain from my window is streaking in vertical swaths across the cityscape. High tide is just about now and significant portions of lower Manhattan are under six to ten feet of water. Power has been shut down below 29^th Street, creating a ghostly spectacle for New Yorkers, who are used to seeing their skyline ablaze with light. As I sit at my desk the wind is howling and the glass in my living room windows is menacingly pulsating. With each wind gusts, you can feel the momentary pressure right inside the room. Our lights threateningly sputter, but power has remained on. None-the-less, we feel safe and snug with a fire in the living room accentuating the coziness of being at home. The dog still needs walking and he too is loath to step out of the apartment into the unfriendly street. Rumor has it that due to the flooding, Wall Street may remain closed until Friday. Sitting at dinner, we tried to evaluate the financial loss to the region, but gave up on this conundrum. We will read all about it soon enough in the morning papers.

Damage throughout the East Coast was horrendous. I will not attempt to describe it… you will surely read about it in your newspapers and see it endlessly on the television. Mercifully my little personal account of the storm is tame… it will continue to howl through the night as it slowly is abating….

 

Tuesaday, October 30th 

The Aftermath:  Tuesday Morning

All night long the wind was howling, but as it tapered off, it resonated into an eerie whistle as it found its way through air conditioner brackets… the secession of rain pounding on the windows made for an unexpected extra hours of sleep. The storm has passed. … Our part of upper Manhattan came through unscathed. Not so the rest of the city. Downtown there is no electricity – tunnels and subways are flooded (salt water and third rails don’t mix well). My meeting on West 26^th Street was called off due to six foot of flooding in the lobby and of course no electricity.

Trees that tumbled in the night at our local Cooper Hewitt Museum on 90th Street

Still, the city got off fairly easily. New Jersey was destroyed. Over two and a half million people have been dislodged… some forever as their house were uprooted and tossed into the middle of middle of streets and state highways…..Railroad cars floated onto the major North South Jersey Turnpike – trees are down - electricity will take weeks to restore – the entire shore area (one of the State’s major summer attractions) is in ruins. Telephone and wireless service is disrupted everywhere. We are back in the middle ages as far as communication goes.

Long Island, Connecticut and Rhode Island were similarly hit, but to a much lesser degree, There is no estimate of the death tolls as most places are still inaccessible.

Nantucket was spared and my son assured me that not even a tree had fallen. By ten in the evening the stars came out and there was total calm… not a flag was fluttering…. Our Island has a charmed life!

…And so I sit here in my ivory tower, away from all the havoc, writing this personal report to you. By now, if you are a news hound, you know more than I do!

 

 

The Calm Before the Storm

Hurricane Sandy in New York

1^st installment of a trilogy

Copyright Vladimir Kagan, October 28, 2012

 

As devastating as it has been coming up the East coast, causing death and destruction in the Caribbean, Anticipating hurricane Sandy in New York has been more of a party event. For us New Yorkers, it was business as usual only pleasanter… Museums were empty but the queues at the grocery stores stretched around the corner. These stores are being emptied of water and comestibles… in fact it is the best selling day that they have enjoyed in years. Gourmet purveyors have run out of white truffles early in the day.

  

Scenes from my favorite Grocer: Fairway - Queues extending into the streets - empty bread bins and little meat. (I am sure there might have been some herring in cream sauce or white anchovies left in the deli section- my absolute preferred "nosh"... too bad I missed being there,

 

The city was officially closed down at 7 PM this evening. All public transportation ground to a halt, not by the storm but by executive order of our Mayor Bloomberg. Low-lying swaths of the city have been evacuated; a very wise precautionary move to prevent uncontrollable disaster.

 

Though torrential rains, flooding and wind are in the forecast, not a drop has fallen so far. The leaves on trees fourteen floors below my window are NOT swaying in the wind. In fact there is not wind. This is what’s called the Calm before the Storm. Not that the storm hasn’t already caused considerable disruptions. Schools are closed and my granddaughters are rejoicing for a late sleep-in. Parties are being planned by the children within walking distance of their homes. The city is quite… a reminder of the little poem about the night before Christmas… “not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse!”

 

All this will assuredly change by morning… those who have followed the weather channel are battened down already. We are taping our widows as a security measure. Flying debris is not our immediate problem, but living in a building on one of highest hills in Manhattan, we will be due for a thorough drenching.

 

Everyone that’s had to travel has left… those that had to get back to New York did so cutting short any planned activity. What will tomorrow bring?

 

A two-day unofficial Holiday?…. Or not!!! Keep posted, I will report as we go along.

 

 

A Gem of a Show NOT to be Missed

The International Art & Antique Dealers Show

Copyright Vladimir Kagan October 23, 2012

 

 

 

 

If you love Modern… you must go see this exhibit! No, not for the one piece of Kagan in the show, or for that matter the modest glimmer of any modern at all. Yes, there was some exquisite Art Deco, a reasonable representation of tepid modern art…one brave modern dealer and a plethora of beautiful antiques…. And, if you were hungry, a decent catered restaurant.

 

The reason I want you to see this show is to enjoy the elegance, quality and style… I love this show for everything that Modern is not.

 

Here is my confession: I am a traditionalist at heart!

 

I was born into the 20^th and 21^st century and am deeply committed to be one of its spokesmen.  As in the poem “Rime of The Ancient Mariner,” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (written in 1797-98) the hero was doomed to sail the oceans of the world and tell his morbid tale forever….my mission is Modern for as long as I live.  But how enchanting it is to visit a world of sumptuous ornamentation, exquisite carvings, and delicate details. These pleasures have been denied to us Modernists. I lament that our challenge today is – minimalism – understatement – purity of lines – elimination of ornamentation – a restraint in use of color. Our mission is the fulfillment of the Bauhaus’ philosophy “Less is More”! Heaven forbid that we be guilty of straying from our accountability to the 21^st Century. It is sad that those who stray do not make it into the glossy tabletop books and magazines that espouse “Modern”.

 

So my designer friends, immerse yourselves into an afternoon of unabashed opulence. It is better than a museum because it is all for sale! What fun for those who can indulge themselves in such luxury?

 

NOTE: This is not a scholarly review, just a brief visit, enjoying the things that caught my eye.

             

 

I am always smitten by the art of the Armor - exquisite details for deadly weapons

These two Nautical items are from my friends, Highland - Granby  

I am always a sucker for diligently painted seascapes - this ice image caught my eye.

The ship's model comes out of an old Nantucket collection - these models were meticulously crafted out of ivory by Prisoners of War.

 

I've alway had a soft spot for Tiffany - this is a rare window displayed by Lillian Naasau of New York

My friend Todd Merrill loves being the odd-man-out. He is the only modern exhibitor in an Antique show. This amazing "Mollusque" table is a one-of-a-kind by Mark Fish of London.

Todd always finds them! A wall mounted sculpture assembled out of 18th and 19th century gilt wood fragments combined with anter, bone, teeth amd epoxy resin by Jennifer Trask

 

Ms. Trask created this wall console out of a pair of Giraffe hip bones

...,and true to his old friend, Todd featured my vintage corner Omnibus sofa

 

The International Fine Art & Antique Dealers Show is at the Park Avenue Armory at 67th Street in New York. Open daily from 11am - 7:30pm

Last day is this Thursday... so hurry up to see it.

 

 

Food for Thought for Foodies

Gripes from an old curmudgeon

Copyright Vladimir Kagan October 21, 2012

(For this article, I have divided my culinary experience into four categories)

When I am in a restaurant, I am constantly annoyed by the superlative adjectives tagged on to food description. Have you ever skimmed through a menu and wondered where bespoke fits into a food description? How about heritage tomatoes, crafted hamburgers, diver scallops, day boat fluke, lazy lobsters! Hand crafted beer, artisan beer…I kid you not. I have been researching Nantucket's restaurant menus. There is hardly a straightforward description of the food you are supposed to order... it often needs the help of an interpreter.... your knowledgeable waiter! Nantucket is rich with creative chefs… let me take you on a culinary tour of their menus.

the waiter as interpreter

1- The Gibberish of Restaurant Talk

Caprese Salad Wands – What’s a salad wand?

Maki Rolls - Maki, is it a fish?

Lamb meatball Lollypops – I’ve heard of lamb chop Lollypops but meatball?

Chicken Ballottine with Eggplant – What’s a Ballottine?

Vietnamese BBQ Short Ribs – I presume very spicy?

Modern Frisée Salad - What’s modern about Frisée?

Japanese ‘steak frites’ Grilled Painted Hills Sirloin with sumo fries– What’s Japanese about steak frites… I presume sumo potatoes are fat?

Island Farm Wedge with miso buttermilk dressing a – Nice pseudonym for iceberg lettuce

Carrot Vichyssoise – What’s wrong with leak and potato, the original French concoction?

Maitake Mushroom Tempura with soba + soy-yuza emulsion - OK what’s a yuza emulsion?

Wagyu Burger - Where is Wagyu?

Day Boat Cod - Presumably a small fishing boat bringing in its catch daily?

American Eclectic – Is that a cool new description for nouvevelle?

Fresh Squid & Chorizo al la Plancha – Who is Plancha?

Ropa Vieja & Manchego Arepas with smoked Bacon - This one needs a Spanish interpreter!

Pernod-scented Escargots - Lets have escargot served with their traditional herb butter

Spiced Duck leg Feullantne - What is a Feullantne?

In retrospect… I am neither a gourmet… nor a Gourmand; I’m a Boer about food…But I have to admit that perusing these menus made my mouth water (proof that the b.s. is working!)

 

2- Cook vs. Chef

Chef - Cook

The difference between a Cook and a Chef as defined by Webster’s Dictionary:

Cook: A person who prepares food, Middle English cõc, from Latin coquus, from coquere to cook (The noun Cook has been downgraded… it now mostly applies to you, your wife or the galley slave in the kitchen.)

Chef: a skilled cook who manages the kitchen (as of a restaurant)

 

 

For starters, it's the salary.  A chef’s salary is exponentially blasted skyward by ego and creative invention.

A good cook earns a salary commensurate with ability and service rendered.

A cook works with a proven recipe and endeavors to follow it to perfection.

A chef immediately attempts to enhance it. This has given us the term "fusion" most frequently applied to creatively altered Asian cuisine... under this heading, anything goes.  Nouvelle cuisine is another vaunted platform for a chef's pipe dream.

Another distinction between a cook and a chef, a cook is usually faithful to the restaurant’s proprietor, getting satisfaction from the accolades of a grateful clientele and, hopefully, reflected in a generous salary. A chef is a restless soul who no sooner has he (or she) established a reputation in an establishment; he moves on to start his own restaurant. In other words, chefs can be fickle employees. (Not so at our yacht club, where the chef has been in residence for fifteen years preparing his Fusion dishes).

 

3- Creative Wine Lingo

No one outdoes the imagination of the wine linguist… a bi-product of imbibing these heavenly elixirs.

Toasty: oak aged

Unctuous: oily

Unoaker: no vanilla creams butter or baking spices

Velvety: lush smooth silky

Tight: not ready to drink – high tannin

Steely: High acid – sharp edge

Opulent: stylish rich

Silky: creamy – “if you like silk for bed sheets then you will most likely enjoy silky on your tongue.”

 

The Underground Wine Letter provided me with some lulus:

“An incredibly sexy nose of smoke, black fruits, cappuccino, and toasty wood is followed by an expansive, terrifically concentrated wine with a sumptuous texture, no hard edges, beautifully integrated acidity and tannin, and a long, 35 second finish. According to the back label, about 5% … was added in the blend of this stunningly aromatic, multi-dimensional wine. It should drink well for 12-15 years. This is a spectacular wine that must be tasted to be believed.”

“Verbena, aloe vera, melisse, lemon-balm, and finally the usual apple; the palate as always is shady and cool, though more overtly mineral than usual, but the finish crescendos into a salty tide that clings and doesn't quit.”

 

4- The Disco Syndrome

Why does a glorified pizza joint or hamburger dispenser or, for that matter, my yacht club or the local fish restaurant, need to dim their illumination to a disco level?  The muted lighting challenges even the young to read their menus unassisted and still difficult to read without the aid of a flashlight.

In a recent restaurant experience, I couldn’t read the menu much less see the food I was eating. If it weren't for the flashlight app on my iPhone, I would not have known if I was eating the doily or the French fries - the catsup or the burger. The kids couldn’t see their drawing and crayons… (That normally keeps them quiet and engaged.) Kids might mistake your red wine for their Coke – You can’t see where you are walking on your way the “Gents” or “Ladies”. For the vision impaired it is a nightmare!m Finally, I couldn’t see the bill I was paying!

The family and I trying to read a pizza menu (thank God for the Flashlight App on my iPhone!)

This is a safety issue!

My dear readers, please take this up with your local Board of Selectmen or Town Councils. For the lawyers amongst you this is a good bi-partisan Public Service issue to help build your community reputation: Let’s ban nightclub lighting for restaurants! “Restaurant Safety for the Public… RSP.”

 

I want a progress report on this one!

A Whirlwind Tour of Seattle

Seattle

Copyright Vladimir Kagan, October 3, 2012

 

You know you’re leaving LA when all the passengers look like yourself: a bit dumpy, ill fitting blue jeans, and Merrell shoes worn-down at the heels. No more glamorous ladies in scanty mini-skirts, hot pants and 6” heels… we were definitely heading north to Seattle.

 

Puget Sound hasn't changed a bit in the fifty years since I have been there... but everything else did!

Illya and I arrived in Seattle on Sunday afternoon and were met by our Nantucket friend and sailing buddy, Colin Sykes. Colin is the Assistant Head Coach for Woman’s Crew at University of Washington. This is no ordinary job; his job is whipping eighty young women into competitive shape… Washington has numerous undefeated athletic teams that roam the United States campuses. (University of Washington Rowing sent 13 rowers to this summer’s London Olympics!) Colin’s latest challenge, he has invited a blind freshman into his team. Colin remembers from his own rowing days that he did his best effort eyes closed… so why not a blind rower! Unknown to us on the sidelines of this sport is the subtleness of the rowing shells, the oars and the carbon fiber technology that goes into these fragile craft…. Sixty feet long, weighing under 200 pounds! The University owns 60 of these slick crafts, they travel with the girls wherever their meets are… this means cross-country trips in two days with three coaches taking turns at nonstop driving.

 

Collin Sykes showing us one of the 60 rowing shells at University of Washington 

 

The subtle difference in the shells and oars... part of the cache at University of Washington

 

The launching ramp from the boat house

Seattle is a great creative city – A city where smart brains have gathered to shape the world. Try Bill Gates and Microsoft, Howard Schultz, who didn’t start Starbucks but took it to the moon. Charles Geschke, co-founder of Adobe, it’s the home of Nordstrom’s one of the all time innovative department stores, Costco had its origins in Seattle, Scott Cook cooked up Intuit in Seattle, Jeff Bezos started a small on line book-selling company called Amazon and of course my favorite ‘toy plane' manufacturer, Boeing employs 35,000 people assembling their magnificent airplanes…(My visit to Boeing was really my true reason for coming to Seattle… I just built a few business trips around it for tax purposes!)

 

Seattle is the home of my newest showroom, Trammell Gagne’, a well-established designer resource for modern furniture. Tom Hunter, the owner has assembled a sagacious collection of the finest contemporary furniture available in the USA and has added a Kagan Gallery.  Illya and I spent Monday regaling the sales personnel in the showroom with the mystique of “A Kagan Design”. To celebrate this event, Tom corralled a bevy of young designers to listen to my “inspiring” PowerPoint presentation.

 

 

Entrance to my newest showroom in Seattle - Trammell Gagne'

 

Top: vignettes of my display in the showroom

Bottom: Me demonstrating the generous seating capacity of my Serpentine Sofa - we could easily have sat two more ladies!

Top: Illya and I in the Trammell Gagne' showroom

Bottom: Illya explaining some of the finer points of a Kagan design

Seattle is also home to the last remaining hippy enclave; more beards, more tattoos and more body piercing than I’ve seen in many years. If you are a New Yorker and have wondered what happened to our homeless population, Mayor Rudy Giuliani shipped them off to Seattle where you cannot walk a city block without being panhandled

 

Seattle's latest pride and joy, the Central Library, completed in 2004, designed by Rem Koolhaas and Joshua Prince-Ramus was cited by the American Institute of Architects as one of their 150 favorite structures in the USA 

Illya left at the crack of dawn on Tuesday and left me to my own devises. It was to be my “boy’s day-out”… Eric and Gwen, new friends and clients, volunteered to take me to Boeing’s Everett assembly plant in nearby Mukilteo – A thrill matched only by a visit to the Intrepid Aircraft Carrier in New York, which has just ensconced one of the remaining three Space Shuttles on its flight deck. This Boeing plant is the largest building in the world: 472,000,000 cubic feet (try to convert that into acres!)… It is also off limits for cameras, recording equipment and any other electronics (they rattled off a list before entering the secure space.)

 

Boeing's enormous hangers, the largest building in the world, where four of their passengers airliners are assembled. These views are of the sliding doors opening into the gigantic assembly space.

An experimental wind turbine in the Museum area of the Boeing complex

 

This huge facility assembles four types of passenger aircraft under one roof: the Boeing 747, now in its 47^th year in production. It is the workhorse of Boeing’s “money-making machine”. This aircraft takes three months to assemble with multiple stations dedicated to installing different assemblies before the custom platforms move along on a slow moving conveyor traveling 2” every hour. The 747 consists of five million parts! Its starting cost is a mere three hundred fifty million! - A 90% completed stretch 747 stood in front of us, purchased by a private client! - I need not tell you the almost certain destination. While this plane will come in closer to five-hundred million dollars, it is a bargain for the new owner if you consider him traveling with his entire family and countless children, plus an entourage of lackeys and hangers-on. This plane is a perfect traveling hotel and will pay for itself over the next two years in saved hotel bills!

 

Top: The Dream Lifter is a specially adapted 747 designed to carry the fuselage segments from their country of origin to the Boeing Plant

Upper Middle: A segment of the Dreamliner's fuselage with my friend Gwen standing in front to give you an idea of scale.

Lower Middle: One of the jet engines giving you an idea of the over 2,000,000 items going into this Jet Liner.

Bottom: The 787 is the dream machine of Boeing's passenger aircraft. The graceful 787 Dreamliner in flight

Alongside this behemoth are the assembly lines for the 767 and the trim twin engine transoceanic 777. (The 777 need only three million parts and is assembled in two months.) Next to this aircraft is the pride and joy of Boeing: it’s the new 787 Dreamliner. It is the world’s first major aircraft using mostly composite materials and as a result is lighter and roomier and consumes 20% less fuel. It will be the quietest airliner in the sky, it has fewer parts, only 2,000,000. Its prefabricated elements are manufactured in countries all around the globe and we were told that its official assembly time is only three days! (But I was assured that that is a bit exaggerated propaganda, scripted by the spin department.) The first production 787’s are nearing completion and will be delivered on a first-come first-ordered basis to its customers by the end of this year: LOT Polish Airlines, Ethiopian Airlines and some Middle East clients… United will get theirs in due course.

 

To recite all the knowledge dispersed by the well-versed tour guide is like passing a college exam. This eye-opening tour is a 90-minute magic-carpet adventure orchestrated precisely to the minute so that the next group can arrive and begin their escapade.

 

Of course, no visit to Seattle is complete without a trip to the top of the Space Needle, a wonderful relic from Seattle’s Worlds Fair of fifty years ago… (It is also the last time I was in Seattle). The view of the city is spectacular… Bucolic Puget Sound, ferries scurrying back and forth between distant islands, container vessels unloading their China goods - a crisp downtown skyline with a cluster of new high-rises - Dale Chihuly (another native treasure and the most celebrated glass artist in the world)… installed his enchanting glass garden and Museum at the foot of the tower… … No hip city is replete without a Frank Ghery novelty. There below our eyes was his latest contribution: the EMP Museum (Experience Music Project), a building generously paid for by Microsoft’s co-founder Paul Allen as a tribute to Seattle’s pop culture.

Poster from Seattle's Worlds Fair from 1962 - the last time I had visited Seattle

  

Top: Day and night photos of the "Space Needle" for many years Seattle's tallest structure

Middle: the platform walk around the perimeter of the Space Needle, giving the optical allusion of walking down-hill

Bottom: Gwen and I admiring the view of Seattle's new skyline

Dale Chilhuly's magical glass garden at the foot of the Space Tower. Note that in the top photo. the yellow tree is glass while the rust colored foliage is natural shruberry turning fall colors.

Paul Allen's gift to his native city, Frank Ghery's latest "blob" on the landscape, the EMP Museum, celebrating experimental music... so the building is actually apropos

A visit with my friends Eric and Gwen in their 33rd floor eagle's nest overlooking Puget Sound the the city below.

While our West Coast - north and south destinations were vastly different, they had one thing in common: I was driven in two of the most sophisticated sports cars Europe has produced: in Santa Barbara: a Porsche Panamera Sports Turismo 3.6 liter V-6 with 300 horsepower with a top speed of 159 MPH – this four door racing machine has amazing passenger comfort. My friend Michael drove us over dirt roads and hairpin turns like a pro Nascar driver…In Seattle I poured myself into Eric and Gwen’s rare two door, four seater, twelve cylinder V12 Ferrari FF putting out 660 bhp, (top speed 208 mph) We did not reach that mark, but Eric, who drove the car with racecar precision, assured me that it could.

Eric and Gwen with their favorite toy, their Ferrari 12 cylinder dream machine

   
 

The cockpit of the Ferrari

What a way to end a weeklong sojourn from the “dirty side to the shaky side”. *

 

*For the un-initiated this means New York: DIRTY – West Coast: SHAKY.

 

 

 

Link to Trammell Gagne’ showroom:  www.tgshowroom.com.