Cityfile: New York's Most Notable and Influential

• After more than two years on the market, Gisele Bundchen has finally found a buyer for her triplex penthouse at 347 West 11th Street. The supermodel didn't make out nearly as well as she'd been hoping when she first put the 1,700-square-foot apartment up for sale. Originally priced at $10.9 million in Sept. 2007, the pad was listed for $4.5 million when it went into contract last week. Hopefully she'll have better luck with the Barrow Street townhouse that she wants to sell. It's still on the market for $13.95 million. [WSJ, PDE]
• Dave Barger, the CEO of JetBlue, has taken a loss on the sale of his 11th-floor apartment at The Plaza. The two-bedroom pad, which Barger picked up for $10 million in 2007, just sold for $9 million. [Cityfile]
• Daniel Radcliffe has paid $5.65 million for a five-bedroom townhouse at 339 West 12th Street. The 3,000-square-foot property comes with six fireplaces and a balcony that overlooks a 39-foot-long backyard. [NYO]
• Publishing heir James Fairchild and his wife Whitney, who sold their Sutton Place apartment last year for $9 million, have picked up a new home in the Hamptons. The couple has gone into contract to buy a "fixer-upper" in Southampton for "well under" its asking price of $11 million. [NYP]

• Whoopi Goldberg has gone into contract to sell her two-bedroom loft at 101 Wooster Street. The comedian, actress, and View co-host put the apartment on the market for $3.99 million back in June and closed on the purchase of a home in West Orange, NJ just last week. [Cityfile, Sotheby's]
• After going into contract (and falling out of contract) multiple times, the triplex penthouse at 895 Park that belonged to the late movie producer and clothing entrepreneur Charles Evans has finally found a buyer. The four-bedroom apartment, which was first offered for $29.5 million in 2007, was purchased for $15 million by Robert Weisz, the CEO of the commercial real estate company the RPW Group, and his wife Cristina. [Cityfile]More

• A month after he received two offers on his Olympic Tower pad, Nic Cage has gone into contract to sell the 3,550-square-feet apartment. The 48th-floor condo, which Cage bought in 2004-5 for $5.5 million, had been most recently listed for $9.75 million. [WSJ, BHS]
• Well, that was fast. Houston Rockets owner Leslie Alexander has put his penthouse at the Superior Ink building back on the market less than one week after buying it for $25 million. The 6,321-square-foot apartment is now listed with broker Dolly Lenz for a whopping $39.5 million. [Curbed, PDE]
• Artist Bruce Robbins has dropped the price of his three-bedroom loft at 43 Clarkson Street for the second time since first listing it for $4.895 million back in 2008. The 2,800-square-foot apartment, which is located in the same building where fellow artist Julian Schnabel once lived, is listed with Elliman's Darren Sukenik for $3.249 million. [Cityfile, PDE]More

• Andrei Vavilov has officially exited the Plaza. The Russian financier, who sued the Plaza last year to get out of buying a $53.5 million penthouse spread—and ended up paying $11 million for a smaller apartment as part of a legal settlement—has taken a loss on the sale. Vavilov sold the apartment to an heir to the Goya Foods fortune for $8.4 million. [NYO]
• Investor Paul Cejas has dropped the price of his apartment at 834 Fifth Avenue, five months after he listed it for $18.5 million. The fifth-floor co-op is now on the market for $16.5 million. [Cityfile, BHS]
• Leona Helmsley's former Greenwich mansion has gotten another price chop. The 40-acre estate known as Dunnellen Hall is now $60 million, which is a whole lot less than its original listing price of $125 million. [Luxist, DO&A]
• Brandon Fradd, founder of the hedge fund Apollo Medical Partners, has sold his apartment at 68 Jane Street. The three-bedroom that Fradd listed for $4.45 million back in February sold for $3.7 million. [Cityfile]

• Matt Lauer has picked up some new real estate in the Hamptons. The Today show co-host paid $2.15 million for a 1,500-square-foot waterfront cottage in Southampton. The 0.7-acre estate features a boat dock and a wraparound deck overlooking a pond connected to Little Peconic Bay. [WSJ]
• Luigi Zunino didn't come through. Three months after it was reported that the Italian exec was having difficulty closing on the three-unit spread at the Plaza he put a $9 million deposit on last year, the 10,026-square-foot apartment is now back on the market. It's currently listed for $39 million. [NYO, Stribling]
• Retired Pfizer exec Gary Jortner and his wife Cindy, have picked up a new apartment at 15 CPW, just a few floors up from the smaller apartment they listed for $3.195 million earlier this month. The couple paid $5.9 million for developer Gerardo Capo's apartment on the building's 12th floor. [Cityfile]More

• Tom Ford is expanding. (Or hoping to, at least.) The designer is reportedly looking to raise $50 million in financing to expand into womenswear. [Reuters]
• Rents along Fifth Avenue have been falling, of course. But the situation appears to be particularly bleak at the empty shopping mall (or "retail collection") at the Plaza Hotel. [Bloomberg, NYP]
• The downside of diffusion: According to a new survey, consumers say luxury products are too accessible these days and have become a commodity. [WWD]More

Designer Betsey Johnson is creating an Eloise-themed suite at The Plaza, which is also where she held her Fashion Week show on Tuesday. According to the press release, "The Plaza's two-bedroom Eloise Suite will be whimsically decorated in a color palette of 'Eloise pink' and black, and will be full of surprises and distinct "Eloise moments" throughout the guest room."More

Memories of a Real Estate Bubble | Remember the good ol' days of 2006 when people were plunking down millions of dollars for penthouse apartments at the Plaza sight unseen? Those days have long since passed, of course. Fortunately, there's always the continued litigation to keep the memory alive. [NYS Supreme Court]

• Arlene Farkas, the ex-wife of real estate heir Bruce Farkas, has dropped the price of her 14-room duplex at the River House, which she first put on the market in November for $15 million after a state appeals court turned down her ex-husband's appeal to retain ownership of the apartment. The co-op is now listed for $13.5 million. [Cityfile, BHS]
• The apartment where Josh Hartnett had been living until recently is up for sale (or rent). The 2,200-square-foot pad at 237 Lafayette Street, which is owned by music execs James Dowdall and Rose Noone, is available for $2.1 million. Or you can rent it for $7,995 a month. [NYO, Citi Habitats]More

The Unluckiest Hotel in Town | This has been a rough year for the Plaza what with the high-priced apartments that haven't been selling, retail space that hasn't been renting, and the bitter lawsuits that have landed the iconic building in the public eye. Further proof that the Plaza just can't catch a break? A taxi exploded in front of the building yesterday, "sending flames shooting 10 feet into the air as people strolling through the jampacked block near Fifth Avenue and Central Park ducked for cover." [NYP, previously]

• The buyer who paid $37 million for Gerhard Andlinger's penthouse at the Time Warner Center—setting the record as the biggest real estate deal in 2009 thus far—has been revealed. It's Andrei Vavilov, the Russian financier who agreed to buy two penthouses at the Plaza last year for $53.5 million, but ended up suing the developer after his wife  wasn't pleased with the "attic-like" ceilings. (As part of a settlement, Valvilov agreed to purchase just one of the two apartments, and he's since gone into contract to sell it.) Hopefully, Vavilov's wife is happier with her husband's latest acquisition. The full-floor, five-bedroom penthouse on the 78th floor encompasses 8,300 square feet and comes with 14-foot ceilings. [NYT]More

• It turns out Madonna scored a rather sweet deal on the East 81st Street townhouse she went into contract to purchase in April. The Material Girl paid $32.5 million for the 13-bedroom manse, which is about 28 percent less than the $45 million asking price that the house was listed for back in October. [NYT, previously]
• After nearly a year on the market—and three price cuts—writer/director John Ridley has finally found a buyer for his condo at 15 Central Park West. The 2,237-square-foot apartment had been listed most recently for $8.5 million. [Cityfile, Corcoran] More

It's no secret that the situation at the Plaza has been pretty grim what with all the apartments for sale that haven't been selling, retail space that hasn't been renting, bitter lawsuits, and reports of shoddy construction work. And it definitely wasn't a great sign when the condo/hotel started offering free architecture tours to lure people into the building a couple of months ago. We're going to guess, though, that the Plaza's new marketing approach—offering Eloise-themed party packages—won't do much to improve matters: "The Live Like Eloise Slumber Party Package accommodates six guests and includes a suite, a copy of The Eloise Guide to Life, Eloise DVDs, Eloise postcards, Eloise snacks, rollaway beds, and a trophy party for elementary schoolers, or, the hotel hopes, a 'girls night' for adult women. It starts at $3,595." It's really too bad those Russian billionaires who bought condos in the building are moving out. They would have totally loved this. [NYO]

• Kevin Wendle, the serial entrepreneur who co-founded CNET and iFILM, among other companies, has lowered the price of his apartment at 812 Fifth Avenue for the second time since listing it for $14.85 million in January. The 17th-floor apartment, which Wendle purchased for $6.4 million in 2006, is now listed for $9.95 million with Corcoran's Deborah Grubman and Carol Cohen. [Cityfile, Curbed, Corcoran]
• Steve Wynn is about to put his apartment at 817 Fifth Avenue back on the market for $25 million, six years after he failed to sell it for $15 million. The 3,900-square-foot spread, which suffered water damage a few years back, now comes with onyx floors and a leather-lined private elevator vestibule. [NYO]
• Two weeks after it was reported that he was "quietly" shopping his Beresford apartment, Bob Weinstein's 6,500-square-foot duplex has officially hit the market. The six-bedroom apartment with grand stairway, paneled library, two terraces, and three fireplaces is listed with Brown Harris Stevens broker Ileen Schoenfeld for $29.75 million. [NYO, BHS, previously]More

• Attorney Bruce Kaye and his wife Deborah have found a buyer for their two-bedroom condo at 15 CPW. The 32nd-floor apartment, which the Kayes bought for $7.8 million last July and put back on the market for $11.9 million in April, went into contract last week. [Cityfile, MRP]
• More moves at the Plaza: Oscar Schafer, managing partner of OSS Capital Management, has gone into contract to sell his 17th-floor apartment, which had been listed most recently at $12.5 million. And Guy Wildenstein has taken $3 million off the price of his Frank Lloyd Wright Suite, which is now listed with Corcoran's Carrie Chiang for $18.5 million. [NYT, Warburg, Corcoran]
• Bruce Lisman, the former co-head of global equities at Bear Stearns, has gone into contract to sell his apartment at 923 Fifth Avenue, nearly two-and-a-half years after he first put it on the market. The four-bedroom condo had most recently been listed at $16.75 million. [Cityfile, BHS]
• Marc Dreier's two Hamptons properties sold for a combined $10.4 million at auction last week, which is about $2 million less than they were expected to fetch. [Law.com via Curbed]More