The manifest self-satisfaction of the newly opened Hotel on Rivington would be easier to take if the structure itself were better. Though one had no reason to expect that the building, designed by Matthew Gryzwinski and Amador Pons, would turn out well, there was some reason to suppose that the interiors, designed in consultation with the editors of Surface magazine, would have something to say for themselves.

The problems begin as you reach the site, at 107 Rivington Street. There is no sign or panel anywhere to indicate that you have arrived at a hotel. Indeed, even as you enter, this fact is unclear, since the reception area is on the second floor. In this dereliction you may discern the ethos of the club scene infiltrating the hotel: the cultivation of an anonymous exterior enhances, apparently, the self-felicitation of those in the know.

This aspiration to anonymity is especially puzzling since the building, 21 stories of rectalinear glass and stell, is the highest thing for half a mile in any direction and has largely destroyed the scale of the Lower East Side. Also puzzling is the ramshackle air of the entrance. Even accounting for the fact that finishing touches are still being applied, I wonder whether the exposed loose ends are supposed to add just that touch of postmodern abjection that certain design types seem to favor – the architectonic equivalent, if you will, of Brad Pitt’s goatee.

As you enter, you are flanked by flimsy walls covered in mosaic tesserae that call to mind the floor of a drained swimming pool. These are succeeded by still more immaterial walls, coated in white plaster, which vaguely resemble the outcroppings of a grotto. From there, navigating your way through twilit space, you come to an elevator, a darksome affair of padded red leather, with film-noir images that race up the sides as you ascend.

Once you reach the reception area on the second floor, a flat screen behind the head of the turtle necked concierge displays some irrelevant video art, before you pass into a bar area that, in contrast to the rest of the place, is unaccountably bright. Various clashing chairs and tables have been thrown here and there across the space. There is a selection of books, the usual fare in boutique hotels: design monographs, auction catalogs, and the latest thing from Taschen Books.

Clearly the brains behind the Hotel on Rivington are seeking to approximate the totalizing aesthetic experience of such boutique hotels as Philippe Starck’s Hudson Hotel on 58th Street and Ninth Avenue. But a comparison between the two is an object lesson in the difference between brilliance and its total absence.

***

For exactly two years now, the very center of Central Park has been a work zone – or it would have been, except that most of the time when I passed, no one appeared to be working. Yet the Naumburg Bandshell positively bristled under a carapace of metal scaffolds, wooden boards, and occasionally a chicken-wire fence, which occupied half the Mall and efficiently spoiled the visual and urbanistic pleasure of this cardinal point of the park.

Now, finally, the scaffolding has come down and the resulting structure looks – drumroll, please – exactly as it did before, except that it is two years older and has several more dents and dings than before. What has been accomplished? Apparently, new tiles have been applied to the roof. But since the roof is largely invisible, we shall never really know.

Though I hasten to disclaim any technical knowledge of the matter, I cannot bring myself to believe that two years were needed to achieve whatever it is that has been achieved – especially considering that the Central Park Conservancy’s original estimate, back in June 2003, was that the job would be finished by that October. Even if no work was done in cold months – though I cannot imagine what could have compelled this cessation of work, alone among the city’s unnumbered building projects – the project still lasted far longer than was necessary.

Why should we care? Because the thoughtless manner in which the Conservancy boarded up the place and the dilatory fashion in which it went about its business unfortunately typify the high-handed way that now, de facto, it has begun to countermand the public’s enjoyment of the park, not to mention the ham-fisted way it often carries out even those projects that are otherwise worthy.

This same spirit has caused a panoply of fences – whether of wood, plastic, or steel – to proliferate everywhere you look in the park. The Conservancy is surely right that some fences are sometimes needed. But it is part of the conceptual crudity of those in charge that they believe all areas must be fenced in at all times. When in doubt, put up a fence.

Because the Conservancy has done some very good things, and because the public is largely passive, a dangerous unaccountability has begun to characterize the Conservancy’s operations, an implicit assumption that everything it does, however inscrutable it might seem, however contrary it might be to the interests of the public, actually is an unalloyed benefit. That is why there are fences everywhere and why a project that should have taken at most one month dragged on for 24.

In tandem with this is a certain visual and spiritual tactlessness, an inability to see just how ugly the fences are, just how much the protracted and unnecessary presence of all that scaffolding contaminated the park. How much longer will the Conservancy remain unaccountable to the public it is supposed to serve?

***

Just minutes before noon on Friday, when the newly restored Waverly Theater on Sixth Avenue at 3rd Street – now called the IFC Center – dimmed the lights for its first screenings in years, I managed to get a glimpse of its newfangled interiors. The firm of Bogdanow Partners Architects, also responsible for the now-closed Screening Room as well as a small theater at the Tribeca Grand Hotel, has pleasantly designed the premises in a funky neo-Modernist style, from the silvery mesh that adorns the facade above the marquee to the curving lobby space, which feels much bigger than it really is and also gleams with a variety of silvery textures. There are three small screening rooms, with a combined 500 seats upholstered in a variety of pink and purple fabrics. The formerly dropped ceilings have been raised, enhancing the sense of spaciousness. The place has been restored, at a cost of $8 million, by IFC Entertainment, better known as the indispensable Independent Film Channel. This will be the new home of that network’s well-received program “At the Angelika,” a weekly assessment of the latest indie films. With most New York art houses having folded over the past two decades, it is a pleasure to announce that one of them, at least, has returned in such fine form.