Sex and the City Filming Locations – Page 4

October 21, 2009June 16, 2011

The Central Park Conservatory Water

Because I spoke only very briefly about the Central Park Conservatory Water in yesterday’s post regarding the filming of Gossip Girl, today I thought I’d do a more in-depth blog on that location and the myriad of filming that has taken place there over the years. So, here goes. 🙂 The Conservatory Water is so named because in the original plans for Central Park, which were drawn up in 1857 by designers Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux, an oval-shaped conservatory, or greenhouse, containing tropical plants was to be situated in the area where the Model Boat Pond now stands. When the money for that particular project fell through, Olmstead and Vaux instead decided to place an oval-shaped model boat pond, designed after those in Paris’ Jardin du Luxembourg, in the exact spot where the conservatory was originally positioned. Hence the name “Conservatory Water”. Over the years, the Pond became incredibly popular with children and adults alike and, thanks to the model yacht races which are held there each weekend, the area has come to be more commonly known as the “Model Boat Pond”. In fact, ask any New Yorker for directions to the Conservatory Water and I doubt they’d know what you were talking about. 🙂

Besides its weekend boat races, the Conservatory Water is also famous for two statues which are situated along its perimeter. The statue pictured above is of children’s author Hans Christian Andersen, who penned the stories “The Little Mermaid”, “The Snow Queen”, and “Thumbelina”, among countless others. In the statue Hans is depicted reading his tale “The Ugly Duckling” to an attentive little duck. So cute!!! And please don’t ask what the heck I am wearing in the above picture – it was a freezing cold and rainy day in New York and I threw on whatever warm clothes I could find. LOL

At the North end of the pond sits the famous Alice in Wonderland statue, in which Alice cavorts atop a life-sized mushroom with her friends the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, the Dormouse, and the White Rabbit. The statue was commissioned in 1959 by George T. Delacorte, founder of the Dell Publishing Company, in honor of his wife. Legend has it that George’s face was the model for the face of the Mad Hatter in the statue. 🙂

The Model Boat Pond is so incredibly beautiful and picturesque, with its flat pool of reflecting water, curving benches running along its perimeter, lush green foliage and pink cherry trees juxtaposed against the towering skyscrapers of Manhattan’s Upper East Side, that it’s not very hard to see why producers have returned to film there time and time again.

In fave movie 13 Going On 30, the Model Boat Pond shows up very briefly during the montage scene in which Jenna is shown enjoying her newfound age. You can see the Alice and Wonderland statue in the background of the first screen capture pictured above.

In fave show Sex and the City, the Model Boat Pond shows up in the Season One episode entitled “The Power of Female Sex”, in the scene in which Carrie takes French Architect Gilles on a tour of the city. While at the Pond, Carrie says, “I felt like I had landed in a Claude Lelouch film”, Lelouch being a French film director known for his picturesque cinematography. The Alice and Wonderland statue shows up in this scene, as well – Carrie is sitting on top of it in the first screen capture pictured above.

In Just My Luck, yet another of my favorite teeny-bopper movies, cutie Chris Pine has some incredibly bad luck while visiting the Model Boat Pond at the very beginning of the film. Again you’ll notice the Alice in Wonderland statue pictured in the background above. It seems to be a favorite of filmmakers. 🙂

In the 1998 movie The Object of my Affection, it is while sitting on a bench overlooking the Pond that my girl Jen Aniston tells Paul Rudd that she is pregnant.

In fave movie Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Fred is followed by Doc Golightly, Holly’s former husband, while taking a stroll near the Conservatory Water.

And in the 1999 movie Stuart Little, Stuart (who was voiced by none other than Alex P. Keaton himself – Michael J. Fox) and his pal Jonathan Lipnicki race a model sailboat at the Pond. (That’s Hugh Laurie, aka Dr. House M.D., who plays Stuart and Jonathan’s dad in the flick, pictured in the second screen capture above!)

The producers definitely took some liberties while filming this scene, though, because while the race starts out at the Model Boat Pond, it ends up in the Central Park Reservoir, which, contrary to what the movie would have you believe, is not actually connected to the Pond and is, in fact, located quite a few miles away.

At one point, the boats even sail under a small bridge, but, being that the Model Boat Pond has no bridge, I am going to go out on a limb here and say that I’m fairly certain this scene wasn’t actually filmed in Central Park. My guess is that the scene was filmed a few thousand miles away on a soundstage at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City. LOL When watching that scene, you’ll notice that the camera never pans back far enough to show the entire Pond, leading me to believe that producers built their own version of it at the studio in Los Angeles which they then used for the filming.

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The Pond also showed up in I’m Not Rappaport, F/X, Jungle 2 Jungle, The Mirror Has Two Faces, Key Exchange and in 1964’s The World of Henry Orient. And it has even been immortalized in print, as well! In J.D. Salinger’s famous Catcher in the Rye novel, Holden Caulfield laments his problems to the Conservatory Water’s resident ducks.

I honestly cannot recommend stalking the Model Boat Pond enough!! It is one of my very favorite places in all of New York! In fact, one of my favorite things to do while visiting the city is to grab a bagel from a street vendor and eat it while sitting on one of the many benches surrounding the Pond – weather permitting, of course. 🙂 Which is exactly what my best friend, Kylee, and fiancé are doing in the above photograph which was taken during my 30th birthday trip to the Big Apple. 🙂 Ironically enough, while doing research on the Pond for today’s post, I kept running across the following sentence – or some variation of it – written again and again: “The Conservatory Water is so relaxing and peaceful that you almost forget you are in New York.” But to me, the Pond is a perfect representation of what it is that makes New York so incredibly unique. I mean where else can you find a huge and incredibly quiet and picturesque piece of nature located smack dab in the middle of a beautiful, bustling, towering city? 🙂 No, for me, the Model Boat Pond couldn’t be more New York and I never forget what city I am in while visiting it! 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Conservatory Water, aka the Model Boat Pond, is located in Central Park on New York’s Upper East Side and can be reached from 72nd through 75th Streets.

October 7, 2009October 4, 2009

Central Park’s Gapstow Bridge

One of my favorite places in all of New York is the tiny, little bridge known as Gapstow Bridge. Actually, I take that back. I think it’s far more accurate to say that the bridge is one of my favorite places in the entire world. 🙂 I am so enamored with it, in fact, that my entire family now refers to it as “Lindsay’s Bridge”. 🙂 Gapstow Bridge and its surroundings are so incredibly picturesque and romantic that I’ve taken about three hundred photographs of it on my various trips to the Big Apple and I go out of my way to visit it at least once each day while in Manhattan. It’s just one of those places that has the ability to calm me and warm me all at the same time. I just can’t get enough of it.

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Part of what makes Gapstow Bridge so beautiful is its surroundings. The bridge spans the northeast corner of the Central Park Pond and overlooks the beautiful Plaza Hotel to the South, Wollman Rink to the North, and the skyscrapers of the Upper West Side to the West. Believe me when I say that there is no other place like it in the entire world. I can’t be sure where Heaven is located, but I’m pretty certain it has a view of Gapstow Bridge. 🙂

The bridge was first built in 1874 by prominent New York architect Jacob Wrey Mould, who also designed Central Park’s Bethesda Fountain and Belvedere Castle. The bridge was originally built out of wood with intricate cast iron railings, but sadly, due to years of wear and tear, the entire thing had to be completely replaced in 1896. The Gapstow Bridge that stands today was designed by Howard & Caudwell, is made out of a sturdy, medium-grade rock known as schist, measures 12 feet tall, and has a span of 44 feet. It truly looks like something straight out of a movie. And, as a matter of fact, it is!

Because Gapstow Bridge is so incredibly picturesque and unique, it’s no surprise that it is one of the most photographed places in all of Manhattan and has, of course, appeared in countless movie and television productions – many more so than I could ever account for here. But just to name a few . . .

The bridge, of course, appeared in an episode of the quintessential New York series Sex and the City. In the Season 6 episode which was entitled “Let There Be Light”, Carrie and new love Aleksandr Petrovsky sit and eat chocolates on a Central Park bench with the Gapstow Bridge in the background.

Gapstow Bridge was also the site of Nate and Blair’s reunion kiss in the Season 2 episode of Gossip Girl entitled “Remains of the J”. In the episode, Dorota mentions that the bridge is Blair’s favorite spot in all of New York. I knew there was a reason why she was my favorite GG character. 🙂

In Home Alone 2: Lost In New York, the bridge is the place where Kevin McCallister first encounters the Pigeon Lady.

It is also the spot where, on Christmas morning, Kevin gives her one of his turtle dove ornaments and tells her “I won’t forget you. Trust me.” I swear no matter how many times I see that scene, it always manages to bring a tear to my eye.

In the movie The Devil Wears Prada, the Runway Magazine “Urban Jungle” photo shoot takes place right in front of Gapstow Bridge. In the first screen capture pictured above, the camera is situated just above my bridge, facing South.

While visiting New York last December, my family and I happened to run into the production crew for the television series Rescue Me filming on my bridge! Unfortunately, they were just wrapping up when we got there, so we didn’t get to see any of the actual filming or any of the show’s stars.

According to one of the crew members, though, the scene involved two guest stars having a conversation right in front of the Gapstow Bridge. The above photograph shows one of the crew members removing the actors’ “marks” off of the pavement and thus denotes the exact spot where filming took place.

The day we happened upon the filming was an EXTREMELY cold winter day in New York. If I remember correctly, temperatures were a record low for that year. The poor crew members were freezing their buns off, especially when they had to remove their gloves in order to fiddle with something on a piece of equipment. I felt so bad for them, as they all looked absolutely miserable. 🙁 But, even in the extreme cold, they still could NOT have been nicer and answered all of my silly questions about the filming.

It’s a sad truth that most movie locations look better onscreen than they do in real life. It’s the magic of the camera and all the set dressing, I suppose, or the bigger than life quality that being in a movie gives to something that’s behind it. Gapstow Bridge is one of the rare exceptions to that rule. It’s even prettier and more picturesque in person than I’ve ever seen it come across onscreen and I can’t recommend stalking it enough!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Gapstow Bridge is located in the Southeast corner of Central Park in Manhattan. The best way to reach it is by entering the Park at the corner of Central Park South and Fifth Avenue and following the path that runs along the perimeter of the Pond.

October 1, 2009November 15, 2009

The Vera Wang Flagship Salon

While I realize that today should really be the start of my annual, month long “Haunted Hollywood” theme, since I am on a plane right now headed to Manhattan, I decided to write a post about New York, my favorite city in the world, instead. 🙂 And since I’ve had weddings on the brain ever since getting engaged this past May, what better way to start my New York blogging than to write about the bridal salon that puts all other bridal salons to shame- the Vera Wang Flagship Store on Madison Avenue. 🙂 Even though there is no way in heck I could ever afford to purchase a Vera Wang wedding gown (let’s face it, I probably couldn’t even afford the sleeve of a dress in that store! LOL), I deemed the location to be blog-worthy since it appeared in a Season 3 episode of fave show Sex and the City. So, here goes! (Please excuse the above photograph, as it was taken on a particularly windblown New York City day a few years back, and my hair is a bit, um, ruffled.) 🙂

In the episode, which is entitled “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, Carrie and the girls head to the Vera Wang Flagship Salon to try on some absolutely gorgeous bridesmaids dresses for Charlotte’s upcoming nuptials to Dr. Trey MacDougal. It is while trying on the dresses that Carrie laments over whether or not to tell Aidan about her recent affair with Mr. Big. As the girl discuss the pros and cons of coming clean with Aidan, Samantha, of course, resorts to using foul language, causing Charlotte to whisper “Could you please not use the ‘F word’ in Vera Wang!” LOL LOL LOL

Even though Charlotte specifies in the scene that they are at Vera Wang, I wasn’t sure if filming had actually taken place at the legendary Madison Avenue salon until I was able to verify it in the locations section of fave book Sex and the City: Kiss and Tell. And once I knew for sure, I, of course, immediately dragged my then-boyfriend out to the Vera Wang Flagship Store to snap a quick picture. 🙂 Unfortunately, though, because the store is a ” by appointment only” establishment, I wasn’t able to venture inside. 🙁 And being that I stalked the place LONG before I was engaged and had any sort of need for a wedding dress, there was really no reason for me to make an appointment. LOL Such a bummer, too, because I so wanted to see the spot where Carrie and the girls tried on their dresses. I did manage to grab the above photograph of the interior of the Madison Avenue store off of the company’s website, though, and you can kind of catch a glimpse of where filming took place. 🙂

You can also sort of see the store’s interior in the above photograph that I took last December.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Vera Wang Flagship Salon is located at 991 Madison Avenue in Manhattan. You can visit their website and make an appointment to try on wedding gowns here.

March 11, 2009March 11, 2009

Samantha Jones and Smith Jerrod’s Beach House

This weekend after stalking Carrie’s honeymoon villa from Sex and the City: The Movie, I dragged my boyfriend about 15 miles south to stalk yet another location from the film – Samantha and Smith’s beach house. Thanks to fave book Sex and the City: The Movie, which stated that the home was located on Malibu Road, this location was a snap to find! Smith and Samantha’s house, with its curved glass and steel architecture, is quite unique and it’s not hard to see why producers chose it as the residence of SATC’s trendy P.R. exec and her young movie star boyfriend.

In person, the house is absolutely breathtaking. Located right on the sand in Malibu, the home has five separate cantilevered balconies that seem to just hang right over the Pacific Ocean. I can only imagine what the views must be like at sunset! I’m not usually a big fan of modern houses, but this one is pretty special. At the time of filming the home was on the market for a cool $17 million (the price has now dropped to $14,500,000). I believe it was also vacant, which would have made filming there much easier than in a home that was occupied.

Filming of the Samantha/Smith scenes took two weeks to complete and both the interior and the exterior of the real life beach house were used extensively. Featured in the movie were the kitchen area (where Samantha cooks Smith homemade sushi),

the living room where Samantha and Smith celebrate New Year’s Eve in front of a fire,

and the master bedroom, where Smith asks Samantha to stop running off to New York every chance she gets. You can compare the above screen captures to the interior photos of the home shown on its real estate website and on this website. From the looks of it, it seems producers even chose to use the home’s real bedroom furniture for the filming.

The front of Samantha and Smith’s home wasn’t shown in Sex and the City: The Movie, but you can catch a glimpse of it in the above pic. Ironically, the front of the house looks like a normal everyday modern style home and doesn’t give any clue as to the amazing architecture located just on the other side of it. And while the front of the house will not be familiar to Sex and the City fans, the back definitely will be. Public beach access is located fairly close to the house, so if you would like to see the back view – and I really suggest you do – it’s less than a five minute walk down the beach.

The house directly next door to Samantha’s should also be recognizable to SATC fans. It was used as the home of Samantha’s hunky neighbor Dante (played Gilles Marini who is currently competing on Dancing With The Stars) on whom she develops quite a crush. As for Dante’s outdoor shower, I couldn’t find it anywhere. It is my guess that either another home was used for that scene, or a special shower was created especially for filming purposes that was later removed.

Also missing in real life – the balcony hot tub that Samantha relaxes in towards the beginning of the movie.

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Samantha’s house is absolutely beautiful in person and I highly recommend stalking it – or purchasing it if you have the means! If you don’t have $14,500,000 on hand to buy the home, it is also available as a rental property at the rate of $75,000 per month. Being that I’ve never made that amount in an entire year, let alone a month, I think I’m pretty much out of the running on this one. LOL

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Samantha and Smith’s beach house is located at 24826 Malibu Road in Malibu. Dante’s house is located directly next door at 24822 Malibu Road.

March 10, 2009February 4, 2010

The Sex and the City Honeymoon House

Ever since Sex and the City: The Movie premiered last May, I have been absolutely dying to stalk the hotel where the girls stayed during Carrie’s non-honeymoon. In the movie, Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte spend a week at what is supposedly a private villa located on the grounds of a Mexican resort. In actuality, though, not only were the Mexican hotel scenes not filmed in Mexico, but they weren’t even filmed at an actual hotel. LOL In reality, two different locales situated over forty miles apart from each other stood in for Carrie’s honeymoon hotel. The villa the girls stayed in is actually a private home located right off the Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu. And the hotel restaurant where Carrie and the girls drank margaritas is actually a ballroom located at an equestrian compound in Simi Valley named Hummingbird Nest Ranch. And while I have yet to stalk the Ranch – something which I am planning to do in the near future – I did drag my boyfriend out to stalk Carrie’s villa this past weekend.

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My first clue in locating the villa came from fave book Sex and the City: The Movie, in which Sarah Jessica Parker mentioned that the honeymoon scenes were filmed in Malibu. Knowing that there is no hotel anywhere near Malibu that looks at all like the one Carrie and the girls stayed at, I started searching the internet for a private home near the coast that had an infinity pool flanked by two huge built-in planters holding palm trees. And I located the home almost immediately. Then when I came across these close up photos of the house, I knew for certain that it was the place where Carrie spent her honeymoon.

At first I couldn’t figure out why producers didn’t use a real Mexican resort to shoot the honeymoon scenes. But then I remembered that Kim Cattrall and Jason Lewis were already shooting on location in Malibu, so it would have made sense to shoot the honeymoon sequence there, as well. Apparently, the producers were even given the opportunity to film for free at a Caribbean resort (in exchange for a pretty prominent plug of the hotel, I’m sure), but they loved Carrie’s “Mexicoma” joke so much that they decided to keep the honeymoon in Mexico. I actually thought that joke was pretty lame and I can’t even believe they gave up a free five-star filming location to keep it in the script! LOL

Carrie’s honeymoon house is absolutely stunning in person and I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was quite a lot of it visible from the street.

Even the pool area, which was the part of the house featured most prominently in SATC, can be seen from the road! Love it! Quite a bit of the property can be seen from the Pacific Coast Highway, as well.

There is even what appears to be a chapel located on the property, so I am guessing that the owners must rent out their house quite often for weddings. Even though the place didn’t prove to be good luck for Carrie, it still looks like a pretty amazing place to get married. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Sex and the City: The Movie honeymoon house, aka Villa Lizton, is located at 4440 Encinal Canyon Road in Malibu. To see the house’s pool area, you have to drive a bit south of the property.

January 14, 2009February 13, 2009

Location Scout-ing!

While in New York, I just had to take a jaunt over to the real life bar which stood in for Scout, the watering hole owned by Carrie and Miranda’s exes, Steve and Aiden, on Sex and the City. The bar first showed up in the Season Four episode entitled “Ghost Town”, in which Miranda and Carrie are forced to face the ghosts of their relationships past at the grand opening of their exes’ new bar. Scout (real name Onieal’s Grand Street) showed up quite a few times during Sex and the City’s run, most notably during Season Four.

Although I didn’t have a chance to step inside and grab a cocktail at Onieal’s on this trip – as I have said before there was just so much to stalk and so little time – from looking at the interior photographs of the restaurant online, I am guessing that producers chose to use the bar because of its rich mahogany interior. In SATC, Carrie’s furniture-maker ex-boyfriend Aidan was supposed to have built the entire interior of the bar by hand, and Onieal’s hand carved ceiling (which was flown in from Venice many years ago) and wood-paneled walls fit in perfectly with that idea.

I found this location thanks to fave stalking book New York: The Movie Lover’s Guide, but Onieal’s is also featured in a fabulous book that I purchased for my boyfriend this past Christmas called The Histories and Stories of the Best Bars of New York . The chapter on Onieal’s chronicles its sordid history as a speakeasy, a brothel, and a gambling establishment. Owner Chris Onieal opened up the bar in 1995 on the corner of Grand Street and Centre Market Place, in a space that has housed a bar of one type or another since 1875. The most notorious bar that stood on that spot was named the Press Room and it was located directly across the street from NYPD headquarters. During prohibition a tunnel was dug connecting the bar to the police department so that New York’s finest had easy (and secret) access to a watering hole.

Interestingly enough, in the SATC episode entitled “Ghost Town”, Carrie brings Aidan a mulberry bush as a bar-warming gift. She says “Because your new bar is located on Mulberry Street.” Well, that’s not exactly true. Onieal’s Grand Street is located on Grand Street, as the name suggests, in between Mulberry Street and Centre Market Place, but on the Centre Market Place side. Mulberry Street is actually a full block down from Onieal’s entrance. In the above screen capture, you can see that they even went so far as to put up a street sign saying “Mulberry” outside of the bar. LOL

Even though I didn’t have a chance to grab a cocktail at Onieal’s, it is definitely high up on my list of things to do next year. It looks like a very cool place to spend an evening and I highly recommend stalking it. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Scout aka Onieal’s Grand Street Bar is located at 174 Grand Street in SoHo. You can visit their website here.

January 5, 2009February 13, 2009

Samantha’s Meatpacking Digs!

Yet another New York location that Mike, God of Stalking, found for me is the new apartment Samantha moves into early in the third season of Sex and the City. This same apartment was featured throughout the end of the series’ six season run. And I absolutely could not figure out its exact location. According to IMDB, the apartment was located on Gansevoort Street in the Meatpacking District, but after extensive searching on Google street maps, I soon realized that that information was not correct. So, as usual, I enlisted Mike’s help in finding the apartment and, sure enough, he located it in a snap! 🙂

I sent Mike the above screen captures from the Season 3 episode of SATC entitled “Cock-A-Doodle-Do”, which featured Samantha’s apartment quite prominently. He immediately recognized the overhang located at the end of Samantha’s street (pictured in the second screen capture above). It seems Mike had stalked that very overhang earlier this year, after it was featured in the Will Smith movie I Am Legend. Eureka!

So, while in New York a few weeks ago, I dragged my boyfriend right out to stalk Samantha’s Meatpacking digs. Sadly, though, her apartment building looks very different today than it appeared back in 2000 when SATC filmed there. In the early 1900’s, the Meatpacking District was solely an industrial neighborhood, housing over 250 of New York’s slaughterhouses and warehouses. In the 80s, prostitutes and drug dealers moved in, turning MePa, as it is sometimes called, into a seedy and run down part of town. But during the past ten years or so, the entire Meatpacking District has undergone a huge transformation, turning it into one of the most trendy neighborhoods in New York. During this transformation, many of the old slaughterhouses and buildings, including Samantha’s, were given complete face lifts and no longer look as they did a decade ago.

You can see in the above photographs how very different the loading dock area in front of Samantha’s apartment now looks. While it is still, for the most part, recognizable as Samantha’s apartment, the entire bottom floor of the building was recently given a complete makeover and is now home to a trendy restaurant named Spice Market.

And when I saw the building in person, I realized that Samantha’s apartment building on SATC was actually made up of two different exteriors that are located right next door to each other. The front door Samantha is shown exiting and entering on the series (pictured above) actually belongs to the building located directly next door to the building used as hers on the series.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Samantha’s front door is located just to the right of the entrance to Fusion Physical Therapy & Sports, located at 407 W. 13th Street. Her apartment building is actually the building next door, located at 403 West 13th Street in New York’s Meatpacking District.

December 30, 2008February 13, 2009

Mr. Big’s Church

One New York location that I have long been wanting to stalk is the church featured in the Season One episode of Sex and the City entitled “Oh Come All Ye Faithful”. In the episode Carrie, while doing some research on religion for her weekly column, stumbles upon Big and his mother coming out of a church one Sunday morning. As usual, Carrie gets a bit carried away and returns to that same church the following Sunday, in full church regalia, to spy on Big and his mom. At the end of the episode, after Mr. Big introduces Carrie to his mother as “my friend”, the two wind up breaking up – for the first of what is to be many times.

This location was fairly easy to find as in the episode Carrie refers to the church as “Park Avenue Presbyterian”. While not the actual name of the church, when I googled “Park Avenue Presbyterian”, the address of a Presbyterian church located on Park Avenue popped up and, sure enough, it was the one used in the episode. In real life it is named Central Presbyterian Church and it is currently undergoing renovations, so I was not able to get the best photographs of it. But you can see in the above screen captures that the exterior doors look just as they did on SATC.

Filming for the “Oh Come All Ye Faithful” episode took place both inside and outside of the church. And while I did venture inside for a quick peek at the interior, I didn’t take any photographs as I have to admit I would have felt just slightly uncomfortable taking pictures inside of a church for the sole reason that a show by the name of “Sex and the City” was filmed there. I would have just died if a priest had walked up to me and asked me what I was doing! LOL The church is very beautiful inside, though, with stained glass windows, stone archways, and a huge altar, and I am happy to report that it looks very much the same today as it did back in 1998 when the episode was filmed.

While there, I just had to take a picture across the street from the church, at the location where Carrie stands when she first spots Big and his mom. The really sad part about this photograph is that I hadn’t actually seen the “Oh Come All Ye Faithful” episode for a while, yet, for some reason, I still remembered exactly how Carrie was standing in the scene. I am beginning to think I really need to get a life! LOL Turns out, though, that while I had Carrie’s pose down pat, I actually had the wrong location!! LOL As you can see in the above screen capture, Carrie is actually standing in front of the building to the right of the one I posed in front of. LOL Although that building has since been painted white, it still has the same wrought iron window coverings with circular cut-outs.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: Central Presbyterian Church is located at 593 Park Avenue on New York’s Upper East Side. You can visit their website here. In “Oh Come All Ye Faithful”, Mr. Big and his mom exit from the church’s side doors which are located on 64th Street. The brownstone where Carrie stands in the episode is located just across the street at 107 East 64th Street.

December 12, 2008February 13, 2009

No Trespassing and the City!

Every December, while in New York, I make a pilgrimage to Carrie’s brownstone from fave television show Sex and the City. Even though I have visited this location quite a few times over the years, I never, ever get tired of it. To me, it is the quintessential New York location. I was especially excited to stalk Carrie’s brownstone this year because I had read that the real life owners, tired of stalkers taking pictures on their famous stoop, had installed a large metal chain blocking access to their home. I was dying to see if it was true. And sure enough, it was!

My boyfriend and I were cracking up as we walked up to the house and saw the thick metal chain stretched across the entrance complete with a plastic “No Trespassing” sign. I think it is absolutely hilarious that the owners did this because, for one, the chain and sign are a complete eyesore on what is otherwise an ADORABLE townhouse. I mean, the whole thing is just so un-Carrie! The least they could have done would be to put up a cute little wrought iron gate to match the stair railing. Come on, owners! Carrie can’t live in a house with a sign like that – she’s a fashion icon for pete’s sake! And secondly, I think the big ol’ sign only draws attention to the house rather than distracting from it. LOL I just don’t understand people! I mean, if it were my townhouse I’d be standing out there all day, everyday shouting “Yes, this is Carrie’s apartment building and I live here! I am the real-life Carrie Bradshaw! Would you want to take a picture with me? And I’d be happy to sign an autograph for you, too!” It could be like a full time job! 🙂 LOL I really hope that the owners aren’t so completely bent out of shape that they are not going to allow filming to take place there for the much-rumored SATC sequel.

On an ironic side note, for the months leading up to my New York trip I had been jokingly suggesting to my boyfriend that he should propose to me on the top of Carrie’s stoop. It’s a good thing he didn’t take my advice to heart, as his plans would have been seriously thwarted if he had. LOL

Hopefully all of you SATC stalkers out there were able to snap a pic on Carrie’s stoop before the ugly “No Trespassing” chain went up. I am very thankful that I was able to! 🙂 But I couldn’t help but wonder . . .

. . . do you think this could be why such a sign went up? 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It (but don’t trespass!): Carrie’s brownstone is located at 66 Perry Street in the West Village in New York.

September 23, 2008February 13, 2009

The Standard Hotel

My friend Stephanie, who is even more obsessed with Sex and the City than I am, has a birthday coming up this Friday, so I decided to do a little post today in her honor. In Stephanie’s favorite SATC episodes, entitled “Escape from New York” and “Sex in Another City”, Carrie and the Girls take a little vacay to the West Coast. While there, they stay at the uber-trendy Standard Hotel on the Sunset Strip, and it is that location that I set out to stalk yesterday. So Steffi – this one’s for you! 🙂

The Standard Hotel was featured prominently in both of the L.A. episodes of SATC. The Standard’s rooftop pool shows up in several scenes – most memorably it is the location where Carrie discusses a rather painful bikini wax.

The lobby area – complete with its live performance art – is also shown several times.

But most memorable for me is the scene that takes place at the hotel’s front entrance – when Carrie is reprimanded for smoking.

The Standard Hotel is an ultra-trendy, ultra-modern hot spot, with a huge celebrity following. Originally opened in 1999, with celeb investors such as Cameron Diaz and Leonardo DiCaprio (sigh!), the hotel was considered a less expensive alternative to the many other pricey West Hollywood hotels. The Standard is a truly unique hotel – it’s sort of like a W Hotel, only amplified to the power of a hundred. The Standard features ghost chairs and floor-to-wall-to-ceiling shag carpeting in the lobby, blue astro-turfed patios, live nude performance art showcased in a glass case behind the front desk, a roof-top pool/dessert bar, DJ’s spinning tunes nightly in the lobby, and, most famous of all, upside-down signage. The whole thing is not really my cup of tea, but if you are into modern decor and the avant-garde, I highly recommend stalking the place. Today there are four hotels in the Standard chain, with branches in Downtown L.A., Miami Beach and New York. The Downtown L.A. Standard was featured repeatedly in the 2005 movie Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.

BIG THANK YOU to Mike, over at MovieShotsLA, for sending me the above screen captures!!

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The Standard Hotel is located at 8300 Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood. You can visit the hotel’s website here. A room there will run you $240 and up per night.