Cityfile: New York's Most Notable and Influential

♦  Less than a week after it was reported that Justin Timberlake had gone into contract on a fifth-floor condo at the Pearline Soap Factory in Tribeca, the pop star has already closed on the deal. According to property records, Timberlake picked up the three-bedroom condo for $4.689 million, more than half a million less than the asking price of $5.25 million. (He purchased the pad via an LLC called Just Us I.) You can see photos of his new place here. [Cityfile]
♦  Fortress Investment Group co-founder (and former billionaire) Randal Nardone has closed on a "glass-walled duplex skyhome" at 101 Warren Street for $22 million, more than a year after going into contract. [NYO]
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♦  New York's Adam Platt hands out four stars to Drew Nieporent's Corton this week, praising chef Paul Liebrandt's cuisine as "technically complex without being exhibitionist." [NYM]
♦  David Chang's Momofuku Bakery & Milk Bar opened on Saturday. Grub Street has rounded up the public reception. [GS]
♦  A handful of spots including Marquee and the Tribeca Grand have been denied permits by the State Liquor Authority to stay open late on New Year's Eve. [NYP]
♦  A detailed history of the epic battle between Da Silvano's Silvano Marchetto and Bar Pitti's Giovanni Tognozzi. [Page Six Magazine] More

Spotted | Kelly Ripa jogging in Central Park ... John Mayer pulling up to the Bowery Hotel in his Porsche Cayenne ... Natalie Portman sitting down on the set of her new film ... Leighton Meester on the set of a new ad campaign for Reebok ... Philip Seymour Hoffman walking home after having brunch in SoHo ... Russell Brand leaving the Four Seasons hotel on East 57th Street ... Salma Hayek and daugher Valentina standing on the set of 30 Rock ... Debra Messing walking down Madison Avenue ... Katie Holmes leaving her apartment in the East Village ... Jessica Alba filming scenes for her new movie in the Bronx ...  and Justin Timberlake arriving at Dos Caminos for the SNL afterparty, which Jennifer Aniston attended, too.

♦  Things are going from bad to worse for Damon Dash and Rachel Roy: Three months after a bank foreclosed on their two Tribeca condos, Dash's Chevy Tahoe was seized this week after he failed to make the monthly lease payments. Does this mean he's already lost his Maybach? [NYDN]
♦  Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson were supposedly getting engaged yesterday. Today the relationship is supposedly "heading for choppy waters," because Lindsay wants to "explore her heterosexuality." [The Sun]
♦  How is Lindsay's publicist explaining her client's description of Barack Obama earlier this week as the country's first "colored President"? She says no one knows what LiLo really said, since it was "unintelligible." [MSNBC]
♦  Katie Holmes is supposedly refusing to move back to LA after she's finished on Broadway. Why? Because she doesn't get dragged to as many Scientology events when she's in NYC. [NYDN]More

It looks like Justin Timberlake plans to spend more time in New York now that he's gone into contract on a condo at the Pearline Soap Factory at 414 Washington Street, according to the Post. Timberlake's 3,000-square-foot loft, which was listed at $5.25 million, comes with three bedrooms, 14 floor-to-ceiling arched windows, Sub-Zero appliances, and views of the Hudson River. Photos of the apartment where JT will soon be rocking Jessica Biel's body are below. More

♦  Guy Ritchie met up with sons David and Rocco in London yesterday for the first time since October, but only after agreeing to follow a list of rules issued by Madonna, which included no new friends, no fast food, no newspapers, and no TV. [Us, Mirror]
♦  Back in the US, Madonna supposedly threw an "intimate dinner party" at her apartment so she could introduce Alex Rodriguez to a group of her friends. [Mirror]
♦  One week after Tim Robbins experienced a few problems trying to cast his vote in the presidential election, officials now say they pinpointed the issue: Robbins turned up at the wrong polling location, which he might have known if he'd bothered to vote in the mid-term elections. [NYDN, P6]More

♦  Kate Moss is joining honorary chair Marc Jacobs as co-chair of the next Costume Institute Gala Benefit at the Met, along with Anna Wintour and Justin Timberlake. [Telegraph]
♦  Jacobs will also be hosting Housing Works Fashion for Action auction on November 13th. And it's not just his karma bank that's overflowing: He just signed a five year deal with Staff International SpA to produce a men's collection. [Fashionista, WWD]
♦  Mark your calendars: On November 25th, Sarah Jessica Parker's familiar voice will be the one you hear when you take the audio tour of the "Costume: The Art of Dress" exhibit at the Costume Institute. [The Pipeline]More

♦  Kim Cattrall and Sarah Jessica Parker are apparently incapable of getting along: A day after Kim confirmed that there will be Sex and the City sequel, Parker told fans "not to get their hopes up" and that "Kim is excited, but all the deals are not yet done." [Daily Star, People]
♦  It looks like spending time in court, soup kitchens, and sanitation departments hasn't helped Naomi Campbell much. She infuriated passengers on her flight back from London on Tuesday by cutting in line while going through customs at JFK. She swears it wasn't her fault because it was the airline that offered her an escort. [R&M]
♦  Ian Schrager is getting married next Saturday. The bride-to-be is a ballerina named Tania Wahlstedt. [P6]More

♦  Now that she doesn't have Guy Ritchie to boss around, Madonna is finding more time to control everyone else: She's supposedly been "begging" Gwyneth Paltrow to leave her London home so they can spend more time together in New York. She's also busy orchestrating a reunion between Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears: All three will be performing together at Madge's concert in LA tonight. [The Sun, E!]
♦  Padma Lakshmi is apparently on a "man-search" for a filthy rich boyfriend now that her flings with Ted Forstmann and Russell Simmons are over. [P6]
♦  Now that the election is over, Tina Fey says she will be officially retiring her Sarah Palin impression. [Extra]More

♦  A "crazed" Madonna fan stormed the set of Guy Ritchie's new movie this weekend and threatened to kill him with a 12-inch knife before the 16-year-old was arrested. [Mirror, Daily Star]
♦  Is Ashley Olsen planning to marry boyfriend Justin Bartha in a secret wedding on the French Riviera? That's what the National Enquirer claims! Also: She supposedly wants Karl Lagerfeld to design her dress. [Daily Express]
♦  Joaquin Phoenix was acting "odd" and wobbly at an event in San Francisco last week, and now his friends are worried he's back to drinking and doing drugs. [P6]
♦  Beth Ostrosky and Ryan Reynolds both finished the NYC Marathon yesterday, along with about 35,000 other people. [NYDN] More

♦  Is Lauren Bush supporting Barack Obama? Maybe. The niece of the president praised the Democratic nominee in a recent interview and she decided against using her family name for her new clothing line, Lauren Pierce, taking her grandmother's maiden name instead. [P6]
♦  Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson are either engaged or splitting up, depending on what you read. [Daily Mail, MSN]
♦  Marc Jacobs is supposedly jealous that his ex, Jason Preston, is dating someone else, even though he has a new boyfriend of his own, too. [P6]
♦  He can't afford a plane, but Diddy did get to upgrade to a new Rolls-Royce last week. [P6]
♦  In a new memoir, Maureen McCormick (Marcia Brady from The Brady Bunch) says she used to trade sex for coke. [NYDN] More

• It's no fun living near Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. Neighbors in the West Village say the two are "spoiled brats" since they have bodyguards posted outside their apartment on West 13th Street who make neighbors get off the stoop whenever the twins are arriving home, and the twins keep SUVs idling in front of the building for hours at a time. [P6]
• Justin Timberlake has been hinting to friends that he and Jessica Biel may get married soon. [MSNBC]
• Ashley Dupre doesn't like it when randoms make fun of her on the street. [P6]
• Star Jones' new relationship with chef Herb Wilson? The two actually first dated 10 years ago back when she was fat. [NYDN]
• Jennifer Lopez is throwing Marc Anthony a birthday bash at the Bowery Hotel on Sunday. [In Touch]

Spotted | Anne Hathaway walking with a mystery man downtown ... Jessica Alba shopping for clothes with baby Honor in SoHo ... Rachel Zoe and her assistant Brad arriving at Bryant Park ... Julianne Moore about to cross the street in the Village ... Jennifer Lopez going to lunch at Nello wearing an Oscar de la Renta gown ... Alicia Keys solo and chatting on her cell ... Julia Roberts waving to the paparazzi during a walk downtown ... Sarah Jessica Parker walking with her son James Wilke ... Katie Holmes wearing baggy jeans and carrying a bag ... Barack Obama and Lebron James showing up at the set of the Letterman show ... Lauren Conrad making an appearance at Bloomingdale's to promote her clothing line ... Diane Kruger walking her bike on the sidewalk in front of Anthropologie ... Michelle Trachtenberg and a male friend dressed up and walking in the middle of the street in SoHo ... model May Andersen and friends heading to Bar Pitti ... and Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel heading to Southern Hospitality for a late night dinner.

1) Of the many fashion parties over the weekend, none was bigger than Calvin Klein's 40th anniversary bash on the High Line last night. Among the fresh-from-Bryant Park faces present: Francisco Costa, Kimora Lee Simmons and Djimon Hounsou, Brooke Shields, Lindsay Price, Kim Raver, Eva Mendes, Halle Berry, Naomi Watts, Ellen Pompeo, Molly Sims, Alan Cumming, Aerin Lauder Zinterhofer, Anna Wintour, Bee Shaffer, Bryan Adams, Bijou Phillips, Claire Danes and Hugh Dancy, Fabien Baron, Ashley Olsen, Cynthia Nixon, Carlos Souza, Linda Fargo, Casey Spooner, Erin Fetherston, Ellen von Unwerth, Estelle, Rachel Zoe, Fern Mallis, Glenda Bailey, Jared Leto, Coco Rocha, Esther Canadas, Joy Bryant, John Leguizamo, Jay Manuel, Julia Restoin Roitfeld, Jessica Szohr, Kevin Bacon, Kelly Killoren Bensimon, Leighton Meester, Lydia Hearst, Martha Stewart, Ethan Hawke, Olivia Chantecaille, Padma Lakshmi, Rosario Dawson and Stephanie Seymour. [NYDN, NYO, PMc, GoaG]More

• Even though Whitney Port may have the least fake career on The Hills, her alleged PR job at Diane von Furstenberg won't involve actual working, will it? [The Cut]
  
• Both Whitney's new boss and her ex-boss Kelly Cutrone make the Daily News' list of the 50 most powerful New Yorkers in fashion. No prizes for guessing who is number one, of course. [NYDN]
• We all know the supers are back—Linda Evangelista for Prada, Naomi for YSL, Claudia for Chanel—but why? It's because advertisers think their familiarity will persuade us to part with our money in these uncertain times, apparently. [Guardian]