CentralPark

When I fire up a cigar, I'm relegated to the front stoop or the benches over on Central Park West. Many people with basements wind up converting them to makeshift home cigar lounges ... with varying degrees of effort. As a result, what should be an incredibly relaxed, enjoyable experience is tainted by a substandard environment. So, Partagas has decided to raise the bar for cigar smokers across the country.

The Dominican cigar manufacturer will award $10,000 to the cigar smoker who needs it most – to create the "ultimate Partagas Cigar Cave. Do you have ideas? Put them together. If you can demonstrate that you need a pimped out cigar space most, Partagas will deliver.

Implied, of course, is that you need to have somewhere to put it. That leaves me out of the running before it gets started, but I wish all who enter the best of luck.

The weather is getting warmer, and restaurants in cities across the United States are stretching out onto sidewalks. Why not bring a touch of Europe across the Atlantic and enjoy the fresh air? Well, for some, fresh air is what's at issue. Smokers, after spending a winter enduring the elements, are happy to enjoy a bit of comfort. With most cities passing smoking bans, outside has become the last option for a lot of us, and outdoor dining almost always leads to ill will.

I was out on my front stoop a few nights ago, cigar in hand – as I've done for the past two years at this location. Customers at Bistro Cassis, a few doors down, complained loudly and in shrill voices, "You can't do that! It's blowing right at us!" Well, I reminded her, it's a public place, and I can do what I want. I continued to enjoy my cigar, though I moved back a little bit, so the building would provide some cover. Routinely, staff at the restaurant has been unnecessarily rude, perhaps in an attempt to show some advocacy for guests. Routinely, the staff fails.

Had she asked nicely, of course, I would have gladly relocated to the benches on Central Park West, a block away. Most cigar smokers seem to share this attitude. Ask nicely, and we'll accommodate the best we can. Demands and rude tones tend not to yield the desired results.

Smoking bans are an easy target for cigar smokers (and, for that matter cigarette smokers), and I admit, our community gripes about them a bit too much. We're past the point of being productive, and dwelling on the injustice feels like a waste of time. The fight for outdoor spaces, however, is a very real outcome of the prohibition on indoor smoking. Without locations where we can partake of our chosen luxury, we're forced outside. Though the laws vary, most do not prohibit smoking on sidewalks. So, that's where we go, disrupting dining experiences as a result.

Tavern on the Green in New York City's Central Park may have been the second highest grossing restaurant in the U.S. last year but that doesn't make it immune to sale. On Tuesday, potential bidders for Tavern on the Green's operating license took the third of three fact-gathering tours. The restaurant's operating license expires December 31 but interested parties only have until May 18 to submit proposals and $50,000 bid deposits to compete for the license.

The 25,000-square-foot restaurant in Central Park has been a tourist draw for decades. One thing that doesn't come with the license to operate the restaurant is its famous name. The name has been owned by the LeRoy family since 1973. Restaurateur Warner LeRoy took over the restaurant's lease in 1974 but the first incarnation of Tavern on the Green as a restaurant dates back to 1934 when Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia opened the restaurant with a brass key. Le Roy reopened the restaurant in 1976 after $10 million in renovations. Since LeRoy's death in 2001, it has been managed by his daughter, Jennifer Oz LeRoy. The NY Times reports that Michael Desiderio, Tavern's chief operating officer, said last month that the name "Tavern on the Green" had been appraised at $19 million.

Parks officials are planning to select the winner of the license by July. While the restaurant brings in millions of dollars each year it also has substantial overhead and that could increase. The Times says that under the terms of its current license, the LeRoy family is required to pay 3.5 percent of its gross receipts to the city but more recent licenses for other businesses often demand a larger percentage. The restaurant also could use a bit of refreshing. But for potential bidders the promise of a restaurant that is a guaranteed draw is pretty alluring.

Chanel has decided to pull the plug on its avant-garde and attention-getting but extremely costly Mobile Art Pavilion exhibition due to the economic crisis. In October my colleague Tracy Chait reported on the Pavilion's installation in New York's Central Park. Designed by starchitect Zaha Hadid in collaboration with Chanel kingpin Karl Lagerfeld, the high-tech Pavilion (above) is full of self-serving if stylish art inspired by Chanel's iconic quilted handbag. For the Central Park installation alone Chanel paid $400,000 for the space plus a charitable donation. Originating in Hong Kong, it traveled to Tokyo before landing in NYC and was scheduled to continue on to London, Moscow and Paris. Chanel reps cited a "refocusing of investments" in deciding to bring the tour to a premature end.

Yesterday Zaha Hadid's Chanel Mobile Art Pavilion made its way to Central Park, the latest stop on its whirlwind world tour. The curled shiny structure is full of art inspired by Chanel's iconic 2.55 handbag -- pieces like an enormous Chanel handbag spilled over. The work has drawn criticism for its cluelessness, and its place in the Park, which the New York Times calls an "instrument of psychological healing for the weary." Apparently Chanel's little interlocking Cs don't have quite the same calming effect, even when they're wrapped up in Hadid's creativity.

Chanel paid $400,000 to rent space in the park, and has additionally made a donation to the Central Park Conservancy.

When Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week hits New York City this Friday, the hip downtown hotels will of course be flooded with fashionistas. The ones who value refinement and elegance over mere trendiness however will head to the Upper East Side's Carlyle Hotel, a luxurious landmark since it first opened in 1930 and one of our favorite places to stay in the world.

French Vogue editrix Carine Roitfeld recently declared that the Carlyle is her favorite hotel as well, and with the addition of a luxe new spa next month, with its "sleek palette of slate, charcoal and black complemented by finishes in nickel, chrome and glass and rich molding," others are sure to follow suit. Not that the Carlyle lacks for high-profile guests; since it opened nearly 80 years ago, the hotel has played host to an endless procession of movie stars, millionaires and high society.

The Art Deco masterpiece was the perfect setting for both stylish philanderer John F. Kennedy, who owned an apartment on the 34th floor, and legendary cabaret singer Bobby Short, who hung his top hat at the swank Café Carlyle for decades (Woody Allen has also been known to hoist a clarinet there on occasion).