How Much Is a Key to Gramercy Park
Wellllll, considering that you have to live in one of the 39 parkside buildings in one of Manhattan’s fanciest neighborhoods, kiiiind of a lot! Each building pays $7,500 a year for access and gets two keys. Residents can can get their own personal key for $350, a fee that has to paid each year as the locks are changed each year and the keys are made so that they CANNOT BE DUPLICATED.
A “$42 million duplex penthouse, at 18 Gramercy Park South,” offers a free key upon closing. The site was “formerly a Salvation Army residence for single women.” Wonder if they got keys to the private park?
Even if you get a key, there are still rules to be followed. Park rules include: “Appropriate behavior and suitable attire;” don’t feed the birds; no dogs or other animals; no wedding photos; no “commercial photography, film crews, and all equipment (tripods, reflectors, etc.);” no “furniture, such as tables and chairs;” AND THE LIST GOES ON.
Please, explain what else is furniture. Is a stool furniture? What about a rug? What about a table cloth that I just set on the ground or on a tree stump?
@deepomega I think you’re supposed to just have your servant bend over and act as a table if you want to have a tea party or something. Blindfolded, of course, so the splendor isn’t ruined by a pleb having seen it.
Wow, I didn’t know that New York had a private For Rich People Only park! Am annoyed pooches aren’t allowed. I wanna break in and let my dog poop all over that park now. New life goal!
@Megano! Follow your dreams!
@Megano! There is another one in Sunnyside, Queens:
http://www.sunnysidegardenspark.org/
It’s less ridiculously elitist than Gramercy Park (there are frequent events that open the park to the public), but it’s still expensive to join ($300 or so a year) and restricted to people who live in a particular, overwhelmingly white area of an otherwise diverse neighborhood. Gross. Also, there is literally no public green space in the neighborhood, unless you count one block-wide playground.
@emmabee I’ll break into all of them!! Pretty sure my dog has enough poop.
@Megano! Alternately, just let your dog poop on the sidewalk, gather it into a bag, and fling it over the walls of the garden to land explosively where it may? Add live scorpions to create a scorpion bomb for even more exciting results!
Also prohibited:
Laughing
Excessive smiling
Sunshine
Seriously, this sounds like the worst park ever.
@AconyBelle I think that article gave me a rage-induced headache.
That park plays host to a lovely statue of noted actor/assassin brother Edwin Thomas Booth. Also, if you’re lucky(/unthreatening looking?) a stranger might just let you come in behind them. Then you have to ask the nice stranger to let you out again though which is REAL awkward.
So I have actually been to this park! A friend with a knack for ferreting out ridiculous housing situations got himself a long-term dogsitting job in one of those 39 fancy buildings and promptly began bringing a stream of friends into the park on weekends. This ended quickly, though, because once you’re inside the park, there isn’t much to do. You just sit there, thinking about how envious people will be once you told them how you finagled your way into this exclusive park. It brings on some soul searching.
“I don’t have a spare set. All my keys say ‘do not duplicate’.”
“So?”
“So you can’t duplicate ‘em.”
“Sure you can! Such a sweet kid!”
I went on two dates with a rather shallow pretentious architect (known as “Mr. I Don’t Have A Television”) who lived in a glorified shoebox in one of the magical 39 buildings. If he mentioned that key to the park once, he mentioned it 15 times.
@City_Dater you should have totally stolen it from him. (I am a terrible person)
I probably haven’t taken New York up on all it has to offer, but I have been inside Gramercy Park. I even have a (terrible) picture of myself with Edwin Booth.
I thought I would be smart and take a shortcut through a park one day, and it turned out to be Gramercy Park and I couldn’t get back out. Finally I gathered up the courage to ask a stranger to let me out. It was pretty, but probably seemed more so because of the whole Secret Garden aspect.