Twenty years before thinking up the "I want my MTV" campaign, advertising genius George Lois saved Esquire magazine from a swift sink into bankruptcy by transforming it into one of the most visually provocative publications of the last half century. From Lois' first cover for the magazine, which featured an image of boxing favorite Floyd Patterson knocked out in an empty arena, and broke Esquire newsstand sales records, to a 1970 cover depicting a marquee......

Photo via senseable city lab When MoMA and MIT join forces, the result is the highlight of an exhibition that zeros in on "current examples of successful design translations of disruptive scientific and technological innovations, and reflects on how the figure of the designer has changed from form giver to fundamental interpreter of an extraordinarily dynamic reality.” Translation: cool design developments meet scientific concepts meet human nature. The Design and the Elastic Mind is......

ART: This past Friday The NY Times dubbed the new MoMA exhibit Design and the Elastic Mind "exhilarating". Now opened, as of yesterday, we highly recommend stepping inside and delving into the world of flying cars, future software and 200 examples of "successful translation of disruptive innovation, examples based on ongoing research, as well as reflections on the future responsibilities of design." You can also check it all out online. 10:30am to 5:30pm //......

Any color you like, by Unlisted Sightings at flickr; Artist: Jim Lambie at MoMA.Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a shooting on East 39th St. in Manhattan, a large fight on 2nd Ave. in Manhattan, and a child in cardiac arrest on Pitt St. in Manhattan. Police in Nassau County are conducting an active homicide investigation in New Cassel, after they were called to a home where three children--all under the age of seven--were found......

EVENT: Angels and Kings is hosting a Nerd Nite, described as: "the Discovery Channel with beer." This evening brings zombies to life, sort of, with a presentation on the undead titled "Zombies Are Real: Actual Zombies of the Natural World And Why You Might Be One." Drink, learn, be nerdy. 7pm // Angels & Kings [500 E 11th St] // Free LECTURE: Come get schooled on "green architecture" tonight at the kick-off event for The......

Fellas, if you’re in some sort of relationship and haven’t nailed down the V-Day itinerary yet, it’s about time to start making some quick decisions and, regrettably, commitments. Reservations fill up fast and no matter what she says about ‘not expecting anything special’, we all know that’s a big trap. But it doesn’t mean you have to submit to an overpriced prix fixe dinner at a stuffy, overcrowded restaurant; here are some less predictable ways......

THEATER: Lisa Kron’s solo play 2.5 Minute Ride, which won an OBIE when it premiered at the Public Theater in 1999, is currently being revived with Nicole Golden as the autobiographical “Lisa.” The play concerns Lisa's attempts to make a documentary about the life of her father, a German Jew who survived the Holocaust but lost his parents at Auschwitz. 2.5 Minute Ride finds him, in his later years, a blind diabetic with a heart......

alphabet city no. 3, by nschaden at flickr Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a shooting on 120th St. and 3rd Ave. in Manhattan, a stabbing on West 31st St. in Brooklyn, and a fall victim at MoMA in Manhattan. The New York Yankees took first place in franchise spending, with a total payroll of $218.3 million last year. The World Series-winning Boston Red Sox payroll totalled $155.4 million to finish a distant second. The......

Computer rendering of the waterfalls by the Public Art Fund. Details have emerged on the ambitious, $15 million East River waterfalls project coming to New York in mid-July to cap off the Olafur Eliasson retrospective at MoMa. The project will consist of four man-made waterfalls, ranging 90 to 120-foot tall, installed temporarily at four sites along the shores of Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Governors Island: by the Brooklyn anchorage of the Brooklyn Bridge, between Piers......

Danish–Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson will work with the Public Art Fund – a nonprofit that brought Anish Kapoor's "Sky Mirror" and Jeff Koons's "Puppy," to Rockefeller Center – to bring freestanding waterfalls to the East River this spring. The project will be officially announced tomorrow, but a source tells the Sun that the waterfalls will rise 60 to 70 feet above the water, which is more than half as high as the Brooklyn Bridge roadway.......

Prefab housing isn't just for the..."thrifty" anymore! Yesterday Wired featured a selection of twelve modular, prefab housing units -- from lofts to place atop city skylines to 60 square-foot cabins with "cathedral ceilings". Today The NY Times reports that the idea has "become fashionable at architecture schools and among an upscale segment of the housing market." As such, MoMA has commissioned five architects to set up their prefab-ulous designs in their vacant lot on......

Perhaps it's the high cost of fuel or the difficulty to find parking, but the arrival of the Smart car has some New Yorkers very excited. The compact car first made its debut in New York at the MoMA, but should be in showrooms in late January. Mercedes Benz parent company Daimler says that over 30,000 people have paid the $99 to reserve one of the $15,000 cars and The Post says many of......

MOVIE: MoMA is currently running a retrospective on Joan Blondell, titled The Bombshell from Ninety-first Street. Trace the metamorphosis of the Manhattan-born actress from a young blonde bombshell to...a blonde bombshell in more mature roles! Tonight you can catch her in Blondie Johnson (1933) and Nightmare Alley (1947). 6 and 8pm // MoMA [11 West 53 St] EVENT: This sounds like the perfect balance of science and romance...and freezing, freezing cold. Learn about your place......

The AP reports on two Picasso paintings that have hung in the MoMA and Guggenheim for decades, and the fight to keep them there. Julius H. Schoeps claims they are the property of his great uncle who was persecuted in Nazi Germany, and has demanded the museums hand over the paintings, "Boy Leading a Horse" (MoMA) and "Le Moulin de la Galette" (Guggenheim). The suit was filed at the District Court in Manhattan. Both museums......

ArtCal calls him, "the most controversial and downright interesting graffiti artist at large in the UK today" and whether or not you agree -- Banksy is decorating our streets, galleries...and even Brangelina's household walls. In New York he has pranked his way into the Met, MoMA, the Brooklyn Museum and the American Museum of Natural History. Recently it was announced that his images would be used to sell luxury condos in Williamsburg...and just yesterday......

It's been a busy month for NY Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff. After tackling Jean Nouvel's skyscraper, Renzo Piano's Times building and the West Side Rail Yards designs, today he turns to the feverishly celebrated New Museum, previewed yesterday by Gothamist. Designed by Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa of Japan-based SANAA, the highly refined seven-story, 174-foot building succeeds, says Ouroussoff, on a "spectacular range of levels: as a hypnotic urban object, as a subtle......

An exhibit at the main branch of the New York Public Library is drawing outrage from Republicans because some of the work on display depicts former and current members of the Bush administration posing for fake mug shots. Each official in the visionary series, called “Line Up”, is seen holding a slate with a date of arrest corresponding to a date when the official said something about Iraq that was not “reality-based.” Matthew Walter,......

MUJI is on the verge of opening its first store in the United States. The Japanese retailer, whose original name meant "No Brand Quality Goods", is opening up a 2,000 square foot location on Broadway. Since we visited last week, the store has taken the protective covering off and stocked its shelves. Gothamist stopped by this morning for a preview. We can already say that one of the biggest issues is going to be......

NY Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff reviews Jean Nouvel's future 75-story tower at 53 West 53rd Street, describing it as "the most exhilarating addition to the skyline in a generation." He compares Nouvel's latest to the Woolworth, Chrysler and Seagram buildings. Filling a 17,000 square-foot vacant lot next to MoMA, the structure will be the future site of a developer Hines' 100-room hotel and 120 "highest-end" (Hines' words) luxury apartments. MoMA, which sold the lot......

Books, or at least book shelves, must be on this couple's wedding registry: The Post has a cute story about a couple whose engagement took place at the Strand Bookstore. Joshua Reich and Shianling King "always told friends they met at the Strand," but they actually met online - their first date was supposed to be at the Museum of Modern Art, but the lines were so long that they went to the Strand instead.......

EVENT: Berlin takes over New York this month with the Berlin in Lights Festival. Through the 18th you can soak up the German city through film, music, art, architecture and more. This evening you can check out a couple of Berlin-esque events. First up is the "Urban Design and Memorials" dialogue. A panel discussion which will touch on the "challenges of integrating memorials into the urban fabric, and how Berlin and New York address issues......

The Landmarks Preservation Commission voted yesterday to landmark eight new sites in four of the city's boroughs - the Bronx loses out. City Room details the new landmarks, which include the Lord & Taylor building, the white brick Manhattan House, two homes on Grand St., the Standard Varnish Works Factory building (its owner thinks the designation is bad for business) and the Greek-Revival style Fillette Tyler Mansion in Staten Island and the Voelker-Orth Museum, Bird......

For those not wanting to hit the big Halloween parade (led by today's interviewee) there are other options: Park Slope's Halloween Parade (info here), Clinton Hill's Halloween Walk (info here) Prospect Park South's Halloween Parade (info here) and Williamsburg's Witches Walk (info here). EVENT: Hallowe'en is Happening Downtown at Trinty Church where both both kids and adults will find spooky spectacles tonight. For the little ones there will be an early evening filled with games,......

MOVIE: MoMA's Modern Mondays series explores innovation on the big screen, and tonight they dedicate an evening to Kevin Jerome Everson. "His films look for the art in everyday life, revealing people's relationship to their crafts and focusing on the conditions, tasks, gestures, and materials in communities. Much of Everson's recent work is inspired by found footage. He manipulates news and sports footage, old films, still photographs, and image files in various ways, subtly repositioning......

New York City was amply represented during last night's National Design Awards at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. The Landscape Design award went to PWP Landscape Architecture, the firm that won the World Trade Center Memorial design competition (with Michael Arad). PWP Principal Peter Walker thanked Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Pataki and described the last four years as "difficult," presumably for the number of redesigns and challenges with moving the project forward, but he......

This week, the NY Times has some suggestions for wedding gifts from stores affiliated to museums, reasoning that those stores have wonderful gifts that are appealing to "people who are tired of shopping in the same old places — and might enjoy spending a couple hours in a museum as well." We wholeheartedly agree - when you know the couple well, that is. If you are wedding gift shopping for a couple you're vaguely acquainted......

Once again, we would like to take a brief moment to thank this week's advertisers on Gothamist. Sarah Silverman Program, with new episodes starting soon! Joe's Pub in the Park, wrapping up this weekend in Central Park. MoMA, with an always exciting schedule of exhibits. The Institute for Media and Entertainment, with a compelling program on Managing Technological Change from October 17-19. Gawker's Guide to Conquering All Media, because who wouldn't want to conquer media?......

EVENT: Join Chief Jim Riches, 9/11 families, rescue and recovery workers in an effort to Tell Rudy Giuliani to "Stop Politicizing 9/11". Rudy will be at a fundraiser at the Waldorf later today, and will be greeted by those who believe he's no hero. Why? They say: "He failed the FDNY & uniformed & civilian victims. He gave us incompetent commissioners ( FD,PD, OEM). No integrated command. He abandoned us on 9/11. He gave the......

Migrating birds should have a safer journey now that the US Post Office has altered the exterior of one of its Manhattan facilities. Migrating birds have annually fallen prey to the Morgan General Mail Facility in Chelsea. The distribution center between 9th and 10th Aves. has a south face that reflects the trees in Chelsea Park on 28th St. Thinking they've found a nice perch, many birds smack into the side of the building. Volunteers......

Drum roll please...here's a list of advertisers this week on Gothamist. Sarah Silverman Program, who has new episodes starting in October. Joe's Pub in the Park, which had shows in Central Park start this week. MoMA, which has what looks to be an exciting Fall/Winter schedule. AMEX New York Dish, a site that caters to people that love to dine. Look Me In the Eye, in bookstores on September 25th. Busted Tees, which is still......