沐浴的最高境界？

沐浴的最高境界?

Among the many vertiginous renderings for the penthouse apartments at 432 Park Avenue, the nearly 1,400-foot-high Cuisenaire rod that topped off last month, is one of its master (or mistress) of the universe bathrooms, a glittering, reflective container of glass and marble. The image shows a huge egg-shaped tub planted before a 10-foot-square window, 90 or more stories up. All of Lower Manhattan is spread out like the view from someone’s private plane.

公园大道432号(432 Park Avenue)是一座高达1400英尺(约合427米)、形同奎茨奈棒(Cuisenaire rod，教算术用的彩色棒——译注)的建筑，上个月已经完工。其顶层公寓有许多令人眼晕的透视图，其中一幅展示的是堪称“宇宙卫浴之王”(或“宇宙卫浴之后”)的浴室，它就好比一个闪闪发亮、反射着光辉的，玻璃和大理石制的容器。从图片上看，一个巨大的蛋形浴缸，被放置在10平方英尺(约合0.9平方米)的窗前，窗外就是90层或以上的高空。曼哈顿下城(Lower Manhattan)的景观一览无余，感觉就像置身某人的私人飞机上。

For those with lots of money and little inhibition, the newest penthouse apartments in New York towers offer bathrooms with walls of glass.

纽约一些高层住宅楼最新推出的顶层公寓，为那些十分有钱、又没什么禁忌的业主，打造出玻璃围墙的景观浴室。

Talk about power washing.

沐浴的最高境界，莫过于此。

The dizzying aerial baths at 432 Park, while certainly the highest in the city, are not the only exposed throne rooms in New York. All across Manhattan, in glassy towers soon to be built or nearing completion, see-through chambers will flaunt their owners, naked, toweled or robed, like so many museum vitrines — although the audience for all this exposure is probably avian, not human.

公园大道432号的空中浴室高得令人眩晕，它们虽然肯定是纽约市最高的，但却并非纽约唯一一处暴露在外的“王宫大殿”。在曼哈顿各地的一座座即将修建或接近完工的玻璃大厦里，透明浴室将会把它们赤身裸体、围着毛巾或穿着浴袍的主人，像展品一样华丽丽地展示出来，就像鳞次栉比的博物馆玻璃橱一样——只不过，这些“暴露展”的观众或许是飞鸟，而非人类了。

It seems the former touchstones of bathroom luxury (Edwardian England, say, or ancient Rome) have been replaced by the glass cube of the Apple store on Fifth Avenue. In fact, Richard Dubrow, marketing director at Macklowe Properties, which built 432 and that Apple store, described the penthouse “wet rooms” (or shower rooms) in just those terms.

浴室的奢华标准似乎已经改变。曾经流行的风格，比如爱德华式或古罗马式，现在已被形同第五大道苹果店(Apple store)的玻璃方块替代。事实上，麦克罗威地产(Macklowe Properties)的营销总监理查德·杜布罗(Richard Dubrow)，对于公园大道432号那套顶层公寓的淋浴室就是这么描述的。而公园大道432号和第五大道的苹果店，都是麦克罗威地产修建的。

Everyone wants a window, said Vickey Barron, a broker at Douglas Elliman and director of sales at Walker Tower, a conversion of the old Verizon building on West 18th Street. “But now it has to be ­ a Window.” She made air quotes around the word. “Now what most people wanted in their living rooms, they want in their bathrooms. They’ll say, ‘What? No View?’ ”

人人都想要一扇窗户，维琪·巴伦(Vickey Barron)是这么说的。巴伦是道格拉斯·艾丽曼房地产公司(Douglas Elliman)的经纪人，负责销售沃克大厦(Walker Tower)，就是西18街威讯(Verizon)老楼的改建项目。“但现在，浴室必须就是一扇窗户，”她着重强调了“窗户”这个词，“现在，对于大多数人来说，客厅里有什么，浴室里就要有什么。他们会说，‘什么?看不到景色?’”

It was a rainy, dull afternoon, but the penthouse apartment with the $47.5 million price tag (in contract, as of this week) that Ms. Barron was showing this reporter needed no artificial light. Walker Tower is just a few blocks north of a landmarked district, which meant the architect, Cetra/CRI Architecture PLLC, could expand the windows to nine and a half feet. In the master bathroom, a massive silvered Waterworks tub looked south, with unobstructed views of Lower Manhattan. This is not “Rear Window” territory; you won’t be seeing your neighbors from the 23rd floor, and they certainly won’t be seeing you. (Because of Walker Tower’s ceiling heights, Ms. Barron said, “the 23rd floor is more like the 30th.”) But you can see the Freedom Tower.

这天下午，天气阴沉，下着雨，但是巴伦带笔者参观的这套标价4750万美元(约合人民币2.9亿元)的顶层公寓，却不需要人工照明。沃克大厦位于一个地标性地区以北，仅几个街区之遥，这就意味着，其建筑商Cetra/CRI Architecture PLLC可以将窗户拓展至9.5英尺(约合2.9米)。在主浴室内，一个泛着银色光泽的Waterworks巨型浴缸朝南放置着，曼哈顿下城区的景观，一览无余地展现在前方。这里跟“后窗地带”(出自希区柯克的电影《后窗》——译注)不同，你不会看到23楼的邻居，他们也肯定看不见你(由于沃克大厦的天花板很高，巴伦说，“23楼就跟正常的30楼差不多。”)。但是你可以看到自由大厦(Freedom Tower)。

From the corner bathrooms at 215 Chrystie Street, Ian Schrager’s upcoming Lower East Side entry designed by Herzog & De Meuron and with interior architecture by the English minimalist John Pawson, you can see the Chrysler Building and the 59th Street Bridge, if you don’t pass out from vertigo. The 19-foot-long bathrooms of the full-floor apartments are placed at the building’s seamless glass corners. It was Mr. Pawson who designed the poured concrete tub that oversees that sheer 90-degree angle.

克里斯蒂街(Chrystie Street)215号，是伊恩·施拉格(Ian Schrager)即将在曼哈顿推出的开发项目，由赫尔佐格和德梅隆建筑事务所(Herzog & De Meuron) 设计，室内装潢由英国极简主义建筑师约翰·帕森(John Pawson)完成。在该楼盘公寓内的转角浴室里，只要你没有因为恐高晕过去，就能看到克莱斯勒大厦(Chrysler Building)和59街桥(59th Street Bridge)。在一套套占据整个楼层的公寓中，长达19英尺(约合5.8米)的浴室，布置在大厦无缝玻璃围出的一角。其中的灌浇混凝土浴缸为帕森设计，坐在那里可以俯瞰90度的壮丽景观。

Just looking at the renderings, this reporter had to stifle the urge to duck.

光是看看透视图，笔者就得抑制住逃跑的冲动。

“Ian’s approach is always, If there’s a view, there should be glass,” Mr. Pawson said. “It’s not about putting yourself on show, it’s about enjoying what’s outside. Any exhibitionism is an unfortunate by-product. I think what’s really nice is that at this level you’re creating a gathering space. You can congregate in the bathroom, you can even share the bath or bring a chair in.”

“伊恩的思路一贯如此，有景观就必须有玻璃，”帕森说，“这不是为了自我炫耀，而是为了欣赏室外景观。任何形式的暴露癖，都是一种令人遗憾的副产品。我觉得最好的一点是，你所创造的是一个聚会空间。你们可以聚在浴室里，甚至可以共用浴室，或者搬把椅子进来。”

On a recent Thursday, there were seven people standing in the master bathroom of an apartment on the 20th floor of 737 Park, another Macklowe project that’s a new conversion of a 1940s building by Handel Architects. (The apartment, three bedrooms in 4,336 square feet, is listed for $19.695 million.) At 21 by 11 feet, there was certainly room in the bathroom for a few more. Along two opposing walls, two toilets and two showers faced off behind glass walls. The by-now-familiar egg floated in the center of the room.

在最近的一个周四，公园大道737号第20层的一套公寓里，主浴室中站了七个人。这是麦克罗威地产的又一个开发项目，由汉德尔建筑事务所 (Handel Architects)对20世纪40年代的一座楼盘改建而来。(前文提到的这套公寓有三间卧室，面积4336平方英尺[约合403平方米]，挂牌价为 1969.5万美元[约合人民币1.2亿元]。)浴室的面积为21乘11英尺(约合6乘3米)，肯定还有地方站下更多人。在层层玻璃墙之后，两个马桶和两套花洒分别沿着两堵相对而立的墙壁排列。浴室正中，放置着大家现在已经很熟悉的蛋形浴缸。

“Some people don’t mind showing a little, and some don’t mind showing a lot,” said Gary Handel, the principal of Handel Architects. “They are totally comfortable in their bodies.”

“有些人不介意暴露一点，有些人不介意暴露很多，”汉德尔建筑事务所的负责人加里·汉德尔(Gary Handel)说，“他们对自己的身材很是自信。”

His colleague, Malay Shah, added that the glass enclosures meant you can see the mosaic tile and marble that sheath the walls. The glass seems to evaporate, so the room is defined by its exterior walls, not its shower or toilet stalls. “It was about the clarity of the idea,” he said.

他的同事马莱·沙(Malay Shah)补充说，浴室外围之所以采用玻璃，是为了让你可以看到浴室墙体表面的马赛克砖和大理石。玻璃仿若无物，因此浴室空间是由其外墙界定的，而非淋浴间或马桶间的隔板。“这涉及到设计理念的清晰性。”他说。

Nine of the building’s C-line apartments expressed an even clearer idea: a wall of glass with two toilets at either end and a shower in the middle, which raised many an eyebrow among brokers and their clients because the toilets face each other. Design clarity — and a well-lit room — suggests questions about how private we want to be in our private spaces.

门牌号带C的那排公寓共有九套，它们展现出了更为清晰的理念：一面玻璃墙，两端各有一个马桶，中间设有一处淋浴间。这让很多经纪人及他们的客户咂舌，因为马桶是相对而设的。设计的透明性——加上一个采光良好的房间——指向问题，那就是我们想要在自己的私人空间里保持多大程度的私密性。

Jill Roosevelt, a broker at Brown Harris Stevens who has been leading her clients through a few of the new, glassy offerings, said 737 in particular sparked conversations about habits of intimacy. “It’s about how much proximity do you want to your partner who is performing these tasks?” she said. “It doesn’t affect sales, but there is always a reaction, ranging from nonchalant to amusement. It depends on how comfortable you feel with your spouse or partner. My traditional couples will say, ‘We’ll frost the glass.’ ”

布朗·哈里斯·史蒂文斯(Brown Harris Stevens)公司的经纪人吉尔·罗斯福(Jill Roosevelt)带客户看了几套带玻璃墙的新房源，她说，737号尤其能够引发人们对亲密习惯的讨论。“这事关你希望同自己的伴侣在使用各项浴室功能时，保持多大程度的亲近，”她说，“这不会影响销售，但客户们对此总会有不同的反应，有些人无动于衷，有些人觉得有趣。这取决于你觉得自己跟配偶或伴侣有多亲近。我接待的那些传统的夫妇就会说，‘我们会换上毛玻璃。’”

One couple — “this would be the amused couple,” Ms. Roosevelt said — pondered the dueling commodes of the C-line at 737 Park with interest. “Well, I guess we could watch each other read the newspaper,” the wife said finally.

有一对夫妇——“这应该就是一对觉得有趣的夫妇，”罗斯福说——饶有兴趣地琢磨了一下公园大道737号C排公寓的那对马桶。“好吧，我想我们可以看着对方读报纸的样子。”妻子最终说道。

Jim Stanton, president of the World Wide Group, the co-developer of 252 East 57th Street, the swoopy glass building that will rise to 65 stories in the next few years, wanted the glass walls that enclose the toilet and shower of the master bathrooms there to wear a privacy banner (a stripe of frosted glass). The depth of the frosting, or fritting, as it’s called, said Julia Hodgson, director of development for the World Wide Group, was carefully considered. “There was a lot of sitting and standing behind that glass to get the fritting level just right,” she said.

东57街252号是一栋前卫的玻璃大厦，将在未来几年内建到65层的高度。其共同开发商World Wide集团的总裁吉姆·斯坦顿(Jim Stanton)希望，主浴室马桶间和淋浴间的玻璃墙能够有所遮挡(一条磨砂玻璃带)，以保留隐私。World Wide集团的开发总监茱莉亚·霍吉森(Julia Hodgson)表示，磨砂的程度(或称玻璃熔度)经过了反复斟酌。“为了确定合适的玻璃熔度级别，我们在玻璃后面坐下、站起来好多次。”她说。

Privacy, of course, is not an absolute value, but a value that has changed over time and circumstances, as Winifred Gallagher, an author who has written about the behavioral and psychological science of place, pointed out.

当然，正如研究有关地点的行为学和心理学的作家威妮弗蕾德·加拉格尔(Winifred Gallagher)所指出的那样，隐私并不是一个绝对的价值观念;而是已经随着时间的推移和环境的变化，发生了改变。

“And like everything else, the rich can buy more of it,” she said. “In the city, privacy is about shielding yourself from all the stimuli. Most of us can’t drop the shield entirely even when we’re in our own homes, because the city is right outside. But if you’re high enough, you can waltz around pretending you’re in the garden of Versailles.”

“有钱人可以买下更多空间，正如他们可以买下更多别的东西一样，”她说，“在城市中，隐私就是将所有的外界刺激与自己隔绝。大多数人就算在自己家里，也不能完全放下防备，因为城市就在你的门外。但是如果住的楼层足够高，你就可以在家里随处跳起华尔兹，假装自己是在凡尔赛的花园里一样。”

Furthermore, Ms. Gallagher added, for many the bathroom can be the focus of a lot of anxiety. “You have the scale and there’s the magnifying mirror so you don’t put your makeup on and look like a clown,” she said. “And imagine yourself striding around the bathrooms with all that glass. It puts the pressure on you to be thin and fit, which are also perks of the rich. If you’re thin and fit, why wouldn’t you have this jewel box to show yourself off in?”

此外，加拉格尔还指出，对于很多人来说，浴室可能是集中了很多焦虑的地方。“你有体重秤和有放大功能的化妆镜，这样一来，你就不会把自己化得跟小丑一样，”她说，“想象你自己在到处都是玻璃的浴室里走来走去，这就会给你带来压力，想要变得苗条、健美，这也是当有钱人的额外好处。如果你就是苗条又健美的，为何不把这个‘珠宝盒’买下来，在里面炫耀自己的身材呢?”

Mr. Schrager batted away any cultural or psychological diagnoses. “Your thesis I don’t go along with,” he said. “At Chrystie Street, we put the bath by the window because I think it’s magical to take a bath and look out. I don’t think there’s a paradigm shift in bathing habits. It’s about style and material. I don’t think there’s a social trend towards exhibitionism.”

而施拉格不赞同任何形式的文化或心理学解读。“你这套理论我不同意，”他说，“在克里斯蒂街，我们将浴室设在窗前，是因为我觉得能够一边洗澡一边看着外面的风景，是很奇妙的体验。我并不认为人们的洗澡习惯发生了什么‘范式转移’。这只是装潢风格和装饰材料层面的变化。我并不觉得出现了暴露癖越来越多的社会趋势。”

But it is the case that hotels and nightclubs made by Mr. Schrager and others have stretched the boundaries of public versus private, what we’re at ease doing where, and in front of whom. Stephan Jaklitsch, a Manhattan architect, recalls using the bathroom at the Felix, a nightclub in the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong. Designed by Philippe Stark, the celebrity latrinist, as The New York Post once described him, its granite urinals are set against floor-to-ceiling windows. “It was like you were peeing on the city,” Mr. Jaklitsch recalled. “It was a very powerful feeling.”

不过，实际上，施拉格等开发商修建的酒店和夜总会，已经模糊了公共与私人空间的界限，改变了人们能够放下拘束的场所和可以接受的隐私度。曼哈顿建筑师斯蒂芬・姚克利奇(Stephan Jaklitsch)回忆了他在香港半岛酒店(Peninsula Hotel)的夜总会Felix里，使用卫生间的体验。Felix的设计者是菲利浦·斯塔克(Philippe Stark)，曾被《纽约邮报》(New York Post)称为“卫生间设计师中的明星”。其花岗岩制的小便池就设在落地窗前。“感觉就像在对着城市撒尿，”姚克利奇回忆道，“那是一种很震撼的感觉。”

And infamously, the nightclub bathrooms on the 18th floor of the Standard Hotel in the West Village were curtain-free for a few years, eliciting much false outrage — and publicity.

此外，在西村的标准酒店(Standard Hotel)内，位于18层的夜总会卫生间也因好几年来没有安装窗帘而声名狼藉，由此招致了很多假意的抨击——以及媒体曝光。

“This is the background,” said Mr. Jaklitsch, who recently designed a glass bathroom with no door for a couple in Brooklyn. “People want to import these experiences back to their homes. They are willing to experiment. For developers catering to a wealthy clientele, there’s a financial indulgence in that they’ve devoted so much space, they’re able to push the boundaries even more. It’s also a reaction to the stress of our contemporary lives. Bathrooms, even in the city, are getting larger and larger, and more and more luxurious.”

“这就是背景，”姚克利奇说。他最近为布鲁克林的一对夫妇设计了一间没有门的玻璃浴室。“人们想要把这些体验带回家。他们愿意尝试。对于迎合富豪客户的开发商来说，他们面对的是一种财务上的放纵——既然已经投入了如此多的空间，那么界限也可以突破得更多一点。这也是人们对当代生活中的压力做出的一种反应。即便在城市中，浴室也正变得越来越大、越来越奢华。”

Barbara Sallick, a co-founder of Waterworks, the glistening bazaar whose jewel-like hardware and five-figure tubs like the ones at Walker Tower have become entrenched as totems of the good life, said recently that the American luxury bathroom has been growing for nearly two decades, both as an idea and in actual square footage. “Twenty years ago, we were just emerging from the puritanical era,” she said. “Because it’s Manhattan, not Birmingham, it’s bigger, better, more.”

Waterworks是一个风头正劲的品牌，其珠宝般的五金器具和价位在五位数的浴缸(比如沃克大厦中的那些)，已经被确立为美好生活的象征。 Waterworks品牌的联合创始人芭芭拉·萨利克(Barbara Sallick)最近表示，美国的奢华浴室，不管是作为一个理念，还是就其实际面积而言，都已保持了将近二十年的增长。“二十年前，我们才刚刚从禁欲时代中走出来，”她说，“因为这里是曼哈顿，而不是伯明翰，人们现在追寻的是‘更大、更好、更多。’”

To make the point about how much attitudes have changed about that space, Ms. Sallick shared her salary from 1978, when she started her company. It was $58 a week, a quarter the price of a tub spout from the current Waterworks catalog. The silvered Candide French boat tub at Walker Tower, for example, sells for just over $12,000.

为了更直观地说明人们对浴室的态度发生了多大改变，萨利克透露了她于1978年成立公司时的薪水。当时周薪58美元(约合人民币361美元)，相当于现在Waterworks产品目录中水龙头价格的四分之一。而沃克大厦中的Candide French船型浴缸的卖价，超过了12000美元(约合人民币73450元)。

Still, a tub in a glass box floating high above the urban landscape seemed like a curious choice to her. “With the bath against the window, there is great light during the day but this sense of coldness at night,” Ms. Sallick said. “Nothing to make you feel closed, warm and private. And there is the cityscape that is in itself sort of active, so how do you ratchet that down? All the glass and all the white is beautiful, and it’s hygienic, but it’s cold. It feels more like an operating room. I wonder if it’s for a younger, cooler, audience, someone in a hurry.”

尽管如此，对她而言，将浴缸放置玻璃浴室里、面对着鸟瞰都市的景观，似乎依然是个不可思议的选择。“要是将浴缸正对着窗口，那么白天光线会很好，但是到了晚上就会让人感觉寒冷，”萨利克说，“根本无法让你觉得安稳、温馨、隐秘。而且，外面的都市景观本身又很跃动，你怎么能静下心来呢?满眼都是玻璃和白色，固然很漂亮，也很卫生，但是很冰冷。感觉更像是间手术室。我在想，它是否更适合那些比较年轻、也更新潮的客户，也就是生活节奏很快的人。”