Small or Large, Uptown or Down?

UPTOWN or downtown, small and private or big and bustling.

There are many decisions to be made in choosing a condominium building - especially when the projects are still in the hole-in-the-ground stage but already on their way to being sold out.

The first stop is at a picturesque lot on Vestry Street, just south of Canal. Here, a tastefully chic nine-story building called 33 Vestry will, in a few months, become one of the area's new landmarks. Originally planned to be nine apartments, there will now be a maximum of six in the building: three floor-throughs, two town houses and a sort-of-unbelievable four-story penthouse.

The second stop is the 22-story Lucida, which fills the blockfront on Lexington Avenue between 85th and 86th Streets (the official address is 151 East 85th Street). The Lucida will have more than 100 units and a long list of amenities (swimming pool, gym, yoga and Pilates studio, party room) intended to give it the feel of a year-round resort. It is a neighborhood I've grown accustomed to, having never lived anywhere else.

I would have to move quickly - and spend a lot more money than I ever imagined - to land an apartment at 33 Vestry. Only two are still available: a town house (4,024 square feet of interior space, 1,000 square feet of exterior space, .9 million) and the penthouse (7,162 square feet inside, 3,693 on the outside, million).

"But there's a lot of interest, so it might not be for long," said Brett Miles, one of the four partners in ID Marketing at Brown Harris Stevens.

Even considering that a rooftop swimming pool (a fabulous amenity in my opinion) was included, Mr. Miles did not seem to notice that I was hyperventilating over the over-the-top penthouse.

"If you want to charge more than ,500 a square foot, you've got to keep the top terrace for your penthouse buyer," he said.

I absolutely agreed.

"We made sure everyone had outdoor space," Mr. Miles said, "by which I mean sizable terraces."

The building and its exciting facade, with overlapping panels of translucent stone and glass, are the handiwork of Winka Dubbeldam, a Dutch architect whose New York firm, Archi-Tectonics, is on Varick Street. Mr. Miles credited the developer, Charles Dunne of Vestry Acquisitions (who will live in one of the two town houses), for his commitment to creating a "really fabulous building on one of the last cobblestone streets in TriBeCa."

I glanced around the space at 466 Greenwich Street that serves as Mr. Miles's office, looking for examples of the kitchens and bathrooms that would eventually be in the finished apartments. No such luck. "We're selling on a piece of paper," he said. "It's an art gallery type of thing. Not the same old thing of a bathroom or kitchen set up. It's more artsy than that."

And a bit harder to understand.

Nonetheless, there were a few large photographs on the wall and a long counter with nicely laid out samples of the various materials used in the project. I was starting to tune in to the intentionally minimalist approach. I was also wondering what person, more clairvoyant than I, had plunked down millions based on floor plans, a few glossy photographs and samples (honed Basaltina pavers for the terraces, glass mosaic tiles for the bathrooms, Pompeii stone for the fireplaces). Maybe I was just jealous.

Knowing I could not have these perfect, sophisticated, unusual and totally out-of-my-price-range spaces made me want them all the more. Even parking spots are included in the purchase price. "Don't you think you earned it for around ,000 a square foot?" Mr. Miles asked. Yes, yes, yes.

There will be elevators from the garage directly to the apartments, he said, "so no one needs to ever go in the lobby."

That might be too bad, because in a doorman building occupied by only a handful of other tenants, crossing the lobby might be a nice experience indeed. So would a swim in my rooftop pool. Oh well.

It was time for me to look into what was happening in my own backyard. I entered the ground-floor space of the Lucida's sales office.