A rent-controlled apartment is the stuff of city legend, but Rob Schleifer has chosen a distinctly rural approach to his very urban dwelling.

Chelsea Market, on the ground floor of a building once part of the Nabisco bakeries, is a smorgasbord of food and retail shops.

A set of china, a family heirloom, beautiful, beloved — and fragile. That’s the problem.

The Neediest Cases Fund gave Catherine Gunderson help with food and furniture. Friends have given her newfound joy.

Sotheby’s is selling the renowned floral designer Robert Isabell’s collection of mid-20th-century furniture and sculpture, which includes some sublime oddities.

A transplant from Portland, Ore., is the occupant of a tiny rooftop studio that looks like a country cottage, set on top of a red-brick building in the West Village.

To keep their place pristine, Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz, above, and his partner usually wear shorts and T-shirts at home.New York City’s dirt level — a mix of soot and everything from ground-up car tires to sea salt — is high, and so homeowners who love white rugs and sofas pay a higher price. Call it the dirt tax.

To keep their place pristine, Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz, above, and his partner usually wear shorts and T-shirts at home.New York City’s dirt level — a mix of soot and everything from ground-up car tires to sea salt — is high, and so homeowners who love white rugs and sofas pay a higher price. Call it the dirt tax.

Robert and Cortney Novogratz, who have seven children, have renovated 11 properties and lived in five of them, creating child-friendly spaces with contemporary art world touches.A couple that has spent the past decade renovating a series of town houses in downtown Manhattan are now looking to their private lives for their next project.

Ria Charisse’s tiny gold-plated pewter hand is $20 at Swallow, her Carroll Gardens store.Just as Brooklyn has become a center for locally produced, handcrafted food, it has also developed a broad population of independent, often artisanal designers.