There are two kinds of New York real estate fame. One comes from the tabloids, and the families mostly try to avoid it. The other comes from the benefit circuit, where a family is honored for things it chose to do in public. This season the second kind is busy.
The Dursts at the Plaza
On November 4, The New York Landmarks Conservancy will hold its annual Living Landmarks Celebration at The Plaza. According to the honoree announcement, the Durst family leads the list, represented by Helena Durst and Nan A. Rothschild.
The Conservancy’s citation is generous, as these things usually are, but it is specific. It describes the family as active in the city for “more than 110 years,” guided by the motto “Generations of builders, builders for generations,” with more than 16 million square feet of Class A property today. It credits the firm, under Helena Durst’s father, Douglas Durst, and his cousin Jody Durst, with 4 Times Square, which it calls the nation’s first sustainable skyscraper, and the Bank of America Tower at One Bryant Park, the first LEED Platinum high-rise office tower in the country. It also cites The Helena, the city’s first residential building to voluntarily achieve LEED Gold, and the firm’s role in developing One World Trade Center.
The other honorees make up a typical Conservancy table: Jamee and Peter Gregory; Jane Hartley and Ralph Schlosstein; LL COOL J; Crystal McCrary McGuire and Raymond J. McGuire; and the architect Peter Marino. Stephen S. Lash will host. The honorary co-chairs include Marina Kellen French, Barbara Tober and Peter Malkin. “New York is blessed with many dedicated and caring people who love and support the City,” said Peg Breen, the Conservancy’s president. Tickets start at $1,500, and tables at $10,000.
The family keeps leasing in the meantime. On October 13, Commercial Observer reported that the World Economic Forum had signed a 15-year lease for 58,131 square feet on floors six through eight of the Durst Organization’s 825 Third Avenue, moving from 350 Madison Avenue. According to the report, asking rents in the building are $83 a square foot, after a $150 million renovation. For a gala crowd, that counts as dinner conversation.
The Silversteins, father and daughter
Downtown, the family on the dais was the Silversteins. On September 22, Commercial Observer held its 19th annual Power Gala at 7 World Trade Center, in partnership with Silverstein Properties, and the evening also marked the 25th anniversary of September 11. DOWNTOWN Magazine’s account singled out the recognition of Lisa Silverstein, the firm’s chief executive and vice chairman, who has been with the company for more than three decades and became C.E.O. in 2023.
Her father, Larry Silverstein, 95, the firm’s chairman and the developer most closely tied to the rebuilding of the World Trade Center site, was in the room. Commercial Observer has reported that he remains one of his daughter’s closest advisers and that the two speak several times a day. Ms. Silverstein has been careful not to describe her role as simply taking his place. “It’s continuity and evolution,” she told the paper. “We each write our own legacy.”
Her own legacy so far includes the last office building on the site. American Express announced this year that it will build its global headquarters at 2 World Trade Center, a 55-story, nearly two-million-square-foot tower designed by Foster + Partners, which Silverstein Properties will develop and American Express will own and occupy. Completion is expected in 2031. “I can’t imagine a better partner to complete the World Trade Center campus,” Ms. Silverstein said when the project was announced.
The family firm also turns up in this week’s other dynastic news. The Real Deal’s survey of real estate families lists Silverstein as a partner, with Rudin and Metro Loft, in converting 55 Broad Street into 571 apartments.
January at the Waldorf
The honors continue into January. According to ConnectCRE, the Real Estate Board of New York will hold its 131st Annual Banquet on January 14, 2027, at the Waldorf Astoria. Lisa Silverstein will receive the Gerrety Humanitarian Award, Gary Barnett of Extell the Mendik lifetime achievement award, and Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch the Zuccotti Public Service Award.
The banquet is the industry’s big annual night, and this year’s falls ten weeks after the governor’s race. The families’ campaign checks, which we tallied in this section this week, will have had their test by then.
The rules of the game
A word on method, since this is a column about wealthy families. The City Politic’s society coverage of the real estate dynasties sticks to what the families do in public: the galas they chair, the honors they accept, the buildings they finish and the statements they make. We do not cover private family matters. We cover the families as builders and benefactors.
Judged that way, the season tells a consistent story. The Dursts are honored for a century of building and for an early bet on green towers, and their leasing business continues. The Silversteins are passing the World Trade Center story from father to daughter while the founder is present to see it.
Featured image: Larry Silverstein, chairman of Silverstein Properties, in 2014. Photo by UJA-Federation of New York via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0.
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