NAST-Y RAT PROBLEM
NEW YORK CITY’S RODENTS seem to be mounting a campaign to take the high-fashion industry by storm. While Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter tells Confidenti@l that rats stubbornly continue to occupy the new Condé Nast offices at 1 World Trade, we’ve also learned that Bergdorf Goodman has a mouse problem.
Word is spreading among rag-trade gossips that building staffers at the luxury department store have found droppings in the back rooms.
“There are girls who go to work there in $700 shoes, and they were jumping around trying to run from mice,” snarked one fashion editor. “I don’t think there was evidence of mice on the store levels, but everyone was freaking out that a customer would find mouse droppings or a mouse would run by a customer’s feet,” said the gossip.
“Beyoncé had been in there shopping that week and they were like, ‘Thank God Beyoncé didn’t see a mouse while shopping here!” said the source. Heaven forbid!
Meanwhile, their furry little allies downtown at Condé Nast’s new headquarters remain firmly entrenched.
After hearing the problem is now so bad that Vogue editor in chief Anna Win
tour (below, with Carter) doesn’t even want to go in the building, Confidenti@l bumped into Carter outside 1 World Trade Center, where the publishing house set up shop in November. We asked Carter if the little beasts are as disgusting as we’ve heard. “They’re rats!” he laughed. “What do you think?”
Earlier reports said the pests were terrorizing his glamorous staff, but we’re now told the vermin have “taken over” more of the publishing house.
“A bunch ate through the ceiling of a sports editor’s office and crawled all over his desk and left poops on his keyboard,” said a different source. “They ate through his rug to fit under his door.”
We’re told Condé is fighting back and has sent a memo to staff in the building, saying “they cannot eat at their desks,” and that a complaint to the city’s health department is next on the agenda.
The Durst Organization, which manages 1 World Trade Center for the Port Authority, declined to comment on the reports.
Reps for Conde Nast and Bergdorf Goodman did not respond to requests for comment.