Condé Nast Moving To Financial District?

Fashion Week just said goodbye to Bryant Park. Now the stylish waifs who covered it at the nearby offices of Condé Nast's Vogue might follow suit. Si Newhouse's media empire is considering an HQ move from 4 Times Square West to One World Trade Center (fka the Freedom Tower), which might be completed before the 2nd Avenue Subway.

The move is exciting for several reasons, not least of which is that it forced the Condé gloss machine to talk to the nasty old Port Authority, which owns the Financial District property.

Elizabeth H. Berger, president of the Alliance for Downtown New York, said:

“They’d do for us what Condé Nast did for Times Square when they built their current building.”

Which I guess was a good thing? Berger points out that the trendsters at Condé publications like Vogue, W, Vanity Fair, Glamour and GQ will fit right in in a (by day) rich person-saturated neighborhood where "the lunch crowd will be very well dressed. And where else can you go to Tiffany and Century 21 on your lunch hour?"

But what about Newhouse's more rumpled minions? What will New Yorker bookworms do if taken beyond monocle-tossing distance of the Algonquin Round Table? Bon Appetit's gourmands would be stuck in what is widely considered a culinary wasteland. And Details writers are surely hoping for a downtown office closer to the Christopher Street piers.

At least the Architectural Digest staff wouldn't have to leave they're much-discussed new home away from home for inspiration.

Photo via Skidmore, Owings & Merrill