Now, if you want a lower-priced but hip experience, there’s also the chic Viceroy next door, which opened last October. Our publishers also tried it out last week and enjoyed it very much...

… not least because they had this great view of Central Park from their room on the 26th floor (out of 28).

57th Street is poised for a major resurgence, since it’s getting three other "super-talls" besides One57, like Harry Macklowe and CIM Group’s 432 Park (1,398 feet, still under construction, and snapped from outside the Park Hyatt); JDS Development’s 111 57th at the historic Steinway Hall site (1,350 feet); and Extell’s Nordstrom Tower at 225 57th (1,775 feet).

Restaurants follow the construction action. Recently, 57th has seen the arrival of Bryce Shuman’s Betony, Michael Stillman’s Quality Meats and Quality Italian steakhouse, and the new Quin Hotel’s Wayfarer, not to mention popular standbys like Rue 57 (from the owners of Lavo and Tao) and Shelly Fireman’s down-home celebrity fave Brooklyn Diner.

Of course, East 57th has long been in style, as Douglas Elliman’s Faith Hope Consolo reminded us over lunch last week at her favorite haunt—the garden room of the Four Seasons—on 57th of course, as is her own office, a few feet away. She says the three most expensive retail stretches in the world all intersect 57th and Fifth: 57th between Park and Fifth, which goes for $1,500/SF; Madison between 57th and 72nd, which goes for $2,500/SF; and Fifth between 48th and 58th, which goes for $3,500/SF.

Of course, it’s long been that way, as Audrey Hepburn can here attest.