Where To Find Your Favorite 'Times' Journalists In The New Building
Now that every department at the New York Times has moved into the new building, you're probably wondering where everyone has gone! So let's go floor-by-floor, shall we? And as we work our way up, we'll see who really matters in the Times organization.
Well! Probably not Larry Ingrassia and his Business staff—like David Carr, Joe "Near-Death Experience" Sharkey, and soon, ex-TV Newser Brian Stelter—who are stuck way down on 2 (maybe they sold it to them as "bad views, but a short way down in case of emergency"?). Sharing that floor are various research/administrative-y departments like contracts and news surveys and database reporting, but also fun desks like Escapes/Travel; Investigative, which is run by former "Our Towns" Metro columnist Matthew Purdy; the Science desk (presumably where counterintuitivist John Tierney hangs his hat); and the wacky dudes of Sports. Oh, and Week in Review also gets its own corner on 2.
On 3, we've got a real newsy smorgasboard: City Weekly (hey, Jake Mooney! What's up, Jennifer Bleyer!), the clerical staff, the Continuous News Desk (they still have those?), Alison Mitchell's Education desk (where we presume ethics-loving and Jew-struggling Sam Freedman probably has a cubicle), the Foreign desk (the editors, we assume? If everyone else is, you know, in a foreign country?), and hip-hop and memo loving Joe Sexton's Metro staff—like Clyde Haberman, overwriter Michael Brick, weather poet Robert D. McFadden, and Peter Braunstein-chronicler Anemona Hartocollis. We're not done, though—also crowded into the third floor are the National desk, led by Times lifer Suzanne Daley (though, like the Foreign desk, most of her reporters are scattered in various places); the News Administration, News Design, and the simply named "News Desk" desks; Obituaries, where advance writer Marilyn Berger toils away, presumably maintaining the office celebrity death pool; the limping Regional Edition; and WQXR, the Times-owned classical music station.
Most important, though, is that the "Masthead" also lives on 3. Who, or what, is the "Masthead" desk? Why, simply the Most Important Editors of Our Time, such as executive editor Bill Keller, managing editors Jill Abramson and John Geddes, and deputy managing editor Jonathan Landman, who've clustered in a corner of the floor to protect themselves from the unwashed masses.
Up on 4, we've got Sam Sifton and his Culture clique—Alessandra Stanley, Bill Carter, Virginia Heffernan, Jon Pareles, Kelefa "K" Sanneh, etc.—who share space with a bunch of other features-y departments. We've got Trish Hall's Home section, which, of course, is not just for rich people! This floor is also where Pete Wells holds court over the Dining section, which is home to sometime bartender Frank Bruni, cheapskate Peter Meehan, and food-world gossipper Florence Fabricant; the Real Estate section, which hopefully will never again publish a front-page story printed at an angle like they did the other week; "Special Sections"; the TV Studio; and (drumroll!) WASPy Jew Trip Gabriel and his Styles minions. This, we imagine, is where the real decisions at the Times get made. It's where Stephanie Rosenbloom sits at her cubicle, calling her mom. Where Guy Trebay and Eric Wilson get into catfights over who's wearing the skinniest pants. Where Cathy Horyn swans into the office in a conceptual muumuu. Where "society editor" Bob Woletz has the power to decide which couples shall receive an announcement the paper's Weddings section, and which shall die a certain social death.
Moving on! On 5, ensconced with, undoubtedly, many bookshelves, we've got New York Times Book Review editor Sam Tanenhaus and his staff, including Paper Cuts blogger and "Inside the List" columnist Dwight Garner, deputy editor Bob Harris, and assorted other book review staff.
On 6 and 7 is Gerald Mazorati and Alex Star's New York Times Magazine—plus the various incarnations of T, Play, Key, and whatever other one-word glossies they're incubating over there. The Art department also has space on 7. And most of the Editorial staff of NYTimes.com, including Digital News Editor Jim Roberts, lives on 9.
Our friends on the editorial page—editor Andrew Rosenthal, deputy editors Carla Robbins and David Shipley, and Letters editor Thomas Feyer—have taken up residence on 13, which they share with some ad operations people from NYTimes.com.
The Morgue has, sadly, been sent off-site, to the Times offices at 230 W. 41st St.
Times spokeswoman Catherine Mathis and her corporate communications cronies are on 17, which they share with the controller's office and part of the executive committee (scary!), part of which is also on 16. Now we're getting to some potentially good views. On 18, we've got the corporate secretary, the "forest products group" (uh, paper?), legal, blah blah. The 19th and 20th floors are home to Ad Sales (and a herd of mice). Then, on 22, which is the very top Times floor (the rest of the building has been leased to fancy law firm Goodwin Procter) are what, clearly, are the most important departments in the place: Circulation and Finance. Just remember that.