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The New York Landmark Preservation Commission is set to review a proposal for renovations to the New York Life Insurance Company Building at 108 Leonard Street in Tribeca, Manhattan. Designed by VIQ Architecture, the plans involve modifications to the Jack Shainman Gallery, which occupies the first three floors of the 13-story primarily residential building. The property was formally known as 346 Broadway and is alternately addressed as 46 Lafayette Street, where the entrance to the gallery is located.

108 Leonard was designed by Stephen Decatur Hatch of McKim, Mead & White in the neo-Italian Renaissance style and completed in 1899. Originally an office building, it underwent a residential conversion in 2014 and currently features 151 condominium units. It was designated a historical landmark in 1987.

The proposal outlines changes to the double-height banking hall including the addition of new ceiling light fixtures and alterations to the walls to create a more suitable space for displaying artwork.

The renovation would also include minor alterations to the building’s exterior, including the modernization of several exterior doors, the addition of a gallery name plaque, and the addition of LED lighting along windows.

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Foundations are steadily progressing at 288 4th Avenue, the site of a 14-story mixed-use building in Gowanus, Brooklyn. Designed by Fischer Makooi Architect and developed by Joseph Vogel, the 146-foot-tall structure will yield 66 rental units, a cellar level, 4,309 square feet of ground-floor commercial space, a public outdoor terrace, and a second-floor recreational area. Crown 286 4th Avenue is listed as the owner and B Contractors Group LLC is the general contractor for the property, which is located on an interior lot between 1st and Carroll Streets.

Recent photographs show temporary wooden fencing surrounding the newly formed reinforced concrete foundation slab and perimeter walls. Steel rebar protrudes around the edges, and an excavator sits along the southern corner of the parcel next to bundles of construction materials. Based on the pace of progress, the superstructure could begin to rise above street level sometime later this spring.

No finalized renderings have been released for 288 4th Avenue except for the below preliminary drawing depicting a simple rectangular massing clad in brick with a symmetrical pattern of white paneling. Balconies lined with glass railings are scattered across much of the main elevation, and a shallow terrace is positioned along the 13th-story setback. The ground floor features more expansive glass for the retail frontage, and the structure culminates in a flat parapet ringed with a railing for the roof terrace.

The nearest subway from the property is the R train at the Union Street station to the north along 4th Avenue.

288 4th Avenue’s anticipated completion date is slated for winter 2025, as noted on site.

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Recently I wrote of a long-time favorite and influential Greek restaurant, Periyali, re-opening in mid-town Manhattan, and this week I’m happy to report that the new Paros, named after an Aegean Island, shows the evolution of Greek food and style with a handsome 3,500 square foot space with a 100-seat dining room and a 40-seat outdoor patio when the good weather returns to TriBeCa.

Owners George and Nicholas Pagonis have taken a decorous clue from the vast space of Milos Estiatorios uptown with soaring ceilings and white walls reminiscent of Cycladic architecture, as well as a reed-like ceiling that lends a note of rusticity. The bar is of white marble, the seat fabrics blue and white, the lighting soft, the sound level not too high, though it would be nice to hear some true Greek music instead of the thudding techno piped in.

George and Nicholas began their hospitality training while working at their family’s diner in Alexandria, Virginia. George went on to work at Anassa Taverna in Astoria and to become culinary director of Kyma Hudson Yards and Kyma Flatiron in New York, where Nicholas was General Manager. Now together, with George in the kitchen, they have taken the favorite dishes of Greek food culture and given them a sharp edge and presentation.

The best way to begin, of course, is with a selection (piklia) of mezzes ($6 each), served with puffy, warm pita bread, including chickpea hummus with tahini of a fine texture and temperature and the spicy tzatziki in rich yogurt and dill. Skordalia is a garlicky spread for that pita, and taramosalata is topped with potatoes and carp and sturgeon roe. Best of all is the delicious melitzanosalata of sweet, lightly smoked eggplant.

There’s also a raw bar of oysters ($24-$46), jumbo crab ($25), shrimp ($24) and lobster ($40) cocktails, as well as a selection of four crudi “cooked” in acidic fruit juices ($24-$29). The appetizers begin with a terrific rendering of with shrimp saganaki ($29), spiked with a dash of anise-like ouzo, oregano and other herbs and ripe tomato with feta cheese and a sprinkling of chili flakes, and you definitely want to share a plate of kolokithokeftede zucchini fritters with lemon yogurt ($20) that are far more enjoyable to nibble on than to pronounce.

Sharing the hefty portion of the slowly braised lamb shank yuvetski ($50) is requisite, for it’s a sumptuous dish brimming with tomato-laced orzo pasta and melting mizithra cheese that gives it a tang.

There are three grilled whole fish, and I’d hoped for more variety, but the Mediterranean lavraki ($43) and fagri ($52) and meaty Mid-Atlantic black sea bass ($48) are all impeccably cooked for maximum succulence, as are the fat tiger prawns Madagascar ($49). The big slices of lemon-drenched potatoes ($12) go with these splendidly.

I love Greek desserts, and the ones at Paros—baklava ($14), the orange-soaked portokalopita ($14) and the semolina pudding galaktoboureko ($14)—have just the right honeyed sweetness and flakiness, while the thick yogurt ($12) is a balm for digestion after all the rest of the meal.

The wine list is more than adequate to convince you of the excellence of Greek wines in this century.

Downtown Manhattan has several worthwhile Greek restaurants, though most are tavernas or pubs. Paros has a panache that is both novel and exciting in this neighborhood, and, while prices are higher than most of the competition’s (except the ultra-expensive Milos), its grandeur and stylistic appeal prove the Greek saying, “Boukia kai syghorio”: “One bite and all is forgiven.”

PAROS

211 West Broadway

212-510-7453

Open for lunch and dinner daily; Brunch Sat. & Sun.

Between Taylor Swift’s ongoing Eras Tour mayhem and her red-hot romance with Travis Kelce, the “Cruel Summer” singer has found solace in her $50 million New York City compound.

Swift, 33, purchased the 7-bedroom $18 million Tribeca townhouse on Franklin Street from “Lord of the Rings” director Peter Jackson in 2014.

She then expanded along the cobblestone block by snapping up three units in the building next door for just under $10 million each.

The top two floors were combined together to create one spanning 8,300-square-foot duplex.

While the pop star has historically been quite private about her personal life, she has, every so often, shared glimpses of the interiors of her luxurious Big Apple abode.

Whether she’s snapping photos of her beloved cats or precious moments with friends, she has shared several sneak peeks from inside her sprawling property, which exhibits a rustic aura inside.

Swift’s dining room is painted with red walls and features a long wood dining table, velvet couches, vintage red rugs and neoclassical chandeliers.

The decor creates an almost baroque minimalist atmosphere that looks cozy and inviting while simultaneously serious and edgy — an apparent homage to her personality.

In contrast to her low-lit romantic living spaces, Swift’s kitchen is quite bright and contemporary.

Swift has shared photos of her yellow-walled kitchen in which there is a stunning white and gray marble island and tons of sunlight streaming in through massive windows.

The ceiling is slated with wooden beams to create a farmhouse feel and her appliances are state-of-the-art yet understated.

The Grammy-winning artist has made sure to make the home the perfect space for hosting parties with a moody wet bar and a classy pool table inside.

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Several A-listers have had the pleasure of exploring Swift’s hallowed halls including Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds, Gigi Hadid and Sophie Turner.

The “Game of Thrones” star and her kids even sought refuge at the songwriter’s downtown Manhattan manse during her divorce from Joe Jonas.

Meanwhile, Kelce, 34, was spotted leaving Swift’s glamorous pad when he was in town for his game against the New York Jets last month.

And it isn’t just her beautiful home that keeps Swift coming back to New York City for more. She also clearly loves the local restaurant and nightlife scene and has been spotted at some of her favorite spots over the past few months.

It’s been many a moon since I sat by myself in the window of a pizza shop and ate a slice while standing and I have to say it is one of the joys of New York living. But also at the new Lucia Pizza of SoHo, which opened this summer on Canal and West Broadway, it is an experience that should not be missed. The pizza is so good, I made a friend over it: the gal next to me and I took our first bites at the same time and couldn’t help but chat about it. (She went back for a second slice because she had to try mine, the spinach.)

The crust is chewy but with a final crunch; the cheese was just the right amount of salty, and the spinach puree was swirled across the top. They use a light touch (fine by me) on the cheese — low-moisture mozzarella made by Lioni Latticini in Bensonhurst — but it is bubbling when they hand over the slice.

The place was packed when I was there, but the staff was still good natured. When my new friend’s second slice was lost in the shuffle, they gave her a free soda.

Lucia Pizza is originally “of Avenue X” in Sheepshead Bay, a slice shop that was opened in 2022 by Salvatore Carlino, who has a serious pizza lineage. Carlino’s parents, Greek and Sicilian immigrants, own Papa Leone Pizzeria, which opened four decades ago in Manhattan beach; it closed when his parents retired in 2017.

The name Lucia comes from the word lux, meaning light, in Latin, and Carlino is going for a “more wholesome approach to pizza, producing a lighter and healthier product, making for an elevated New York style pizza.”

He worked abroad for a several years in the music industry, and when he returned to the East Coast, he installed a brick in his Long Island backyard and started selling pies. He opened the storefront once he built some demand on social media; there are intentions to expand past Soho as well.

Pete Wells reviewed Lucia when it opened in Brooklyn and took some issue with the crust (not me) but also had this to say about the pies: “The tomato sauce tastes fresh and bright, not bitter or sugary. Fresh white mushrooms are cooked and cooked until they taste dark and meaty. That whipped ricotta really is good. Then there are the torn basil leaves tossed on the pies when they leave the oven, along with fine threads of grated pecorino. These are the touches that lift up even the simplest items at Lucia, like the classic New York slice and the margherita, with its fresh mozzarella arranged over the sauce in concentric rings.”

Eater has it on its “iconic pizzeria” list and calls it “one of several heavy-hitter, new-school slice shops…joining L’Industrie Pizza and Mama’s Too.” I didn’t get the new-school thing — I just thought it was good Brooklyn pie. With excellent old-school weekend hours:

Lucia Pizza of SoHo 375 Canal at West Broadway 917-965-2900 Monday – Wednesday: 11a to 10p Thursday: 11a to 3a Friday – Saturday: noon to 3a Sunday: noon to 10p

A melody drifted across the dining room like a smoke ring: “Tall and tan and young and lovely. …”

The singer, sitting at the end of the bar, had Astrud Gilberto’s sultry contralto and calm, unrushed phrasing. There was a guitarist, too, tracing bossa nova rhythms that the bartenders fell into each time they raised their shakers. Overhead, a dark canopy of glossy tropical leaves swayed from the ceiling. For an hour or so, Artesano acted so much like a lounge on the Ipanema beachside that it would have been churlish to point out that almost everything on its menu comes from Peru’s west coast, about 3,000 miles from Rio de Janeiro.

And why argue? It’s not every day that Peruvian food as intelligently assembled as Artesano’s washes up on Chambers Street in TriBeCa. Since October, the restaurant has been serving finely tuned and sometimes elaborate dishes like the Artesano ceviche. Rapidly marinated sea bass, soft wheels of poached octopus and golden rings of fried squid — decorated here and there with smooth buttons of puréed sweet potatoes — are built into a low ridge that looks like a footbridge. The bridge crosses a small orange lake of tiger’s milk, a brew of vegetables, herbs and the juices given off by raw seafood. This particular tiger’s milk contains fresh ginger and red rocoto peppers, which help it attain a pulsing level of spice that is almost musical.

The author of this and other, equally elaborate compositions is Rodrigo Fernandini, a native of Chiclayo, a Peruvian city just inland from the coast and more than 400 miles north of Lima. Mr. Fernandini spent several years in Silicon Valley practicing modern California cuisine, but apparently his thoughts strayed back to Peru. He opened a cevicheria in San José, Calif., and ran it for a short time before he was interrupted by the pandemic. Today he has another Peruvian restaurant in St. Petersburg, Fla., called Allyu, and he has Artesano.

Mr. Fernandini cooks neither the home-style cuisine you get at Pio Pio, nor the bold, forward-thinking wine-bar cuisine that Erik Ramirez has honed at Llama San, in Greenwich Village. Mr. Fernandini’s style is closer to the colorful, dynamic plates that Oscar Lorenzzi knocks out at Contento, in Harlem, but it is more formal and precise. He outfits the food of Peru with the kind of dressy, layered refinements that tend to go along with hand-thrown crockery, the option of an extended tasting menu, and a private dining room tucked out of sight somewhere. (Artesano has all three.)

Even anticuchos, which in their purest form are chunks of muscle and organs grilled on sticks following an Andean tradition that predates Columbus, line up in intricate tableaus under Mr. Fernandini’s baton. The filet mignon anticucho is de-skewered and arranged, with spoonfuls of roughly chopped chimichurri, over cherry-size roasted potatoes and what seems to be a creamy emulsification of the dish’s traditional garlic-and-oil marinade. Then slivered scallions and edible flowers are carefully applied to the beef. A rough sauce of rocoto peppers, both hot and sweet, is served on the side.

Described that way it sounds hopelessly baroque. It is essentially steak with sauces and potatoes, though, and together with a pisco sour or two, it would make an ideal small dinner some hot August night.

So would the ají de gallina, shredded chicken over which a fluffy yellow sauce rests like a mustard-colored quilt. Some foods are just spicy enough. Others are just bland enough. Very few are both, and a well-made ají de gallina is one of them. Artesano’s ají de gallina is made so well that I didn’t second-guess Mr. Fernandini’s decision to scatter dried black olives over the sauce.

They’re saltier and more intense than the olives most ají de gallina cooks use, and I feared they would get in the way of the yeasty smoothness of the sauce. They didn’t. Given that Mr. Fernandini decorates his plates like somebody who got a glue gun and a box of rhinestones for Christmas, the surprising thing is that most of his garnishes make the rest of the dish better. The dots of ponzu gel lined up alongside the Japanese-influenced Nikkei tuna tartare really do taste like they belong, even if the real thrill of the dish is the way acevichado sauce — tiger’s milk blended with mayonnaise — soaks into the bed of sushi rice below the tuna.

One exception: the pale potato chunks that take the place of French fries in the lomo saltado. Taking the place of French fries is a tough assignment, and these spuds aren’t quite up to it.

All the other desserts are upstaged by the one called Moray. This should come as no surprise, because it is the only one that looks like an ancient Incan ruin, the sunken circular terraces near Cusco in the Sacred Valley. The concentric rings of the Moray structures have been etched into a delicate cheese mousse, which has to be easier than carving them into a mountain. The fluffy cheese disc is lightly sweet and very calming when you eat it with a spoonful of corn ice cream. The two tiny grilled ears of baby corn are adorable, but they are best regarded as ornament.

The wines are generally fresh and bright and eager to show themselves ready for anything the kitchen throws at them. The house cocktails are all a bit effortful, and there’s little need for innovation given how many classic Peruvian drinks are also on the list. Many are made with pisco, which is such an agile mixer that it can come as a surprise to drink one on its own — Artesano pours about half a dozen by the glass — and find out that it is exactly how you want the meal to end.