World of Leisure: North America — The East 

Dialogue 26 (Gensler), Fall 2014

Ask Gensler New York’s Beth Novitsky about leisure and she laughs. “Around here, it doesn’t exist.” Rob Gatzke agrees. “There’s that ‘New York minute’ thing going on—an expectation of speed.” Asked the same question, Colin O’Brien says that Atlanta “celebrates slow. You don’t want to work up a sweat.” From Toronto to Miami, East Coast leisure comes in local flavors. What’s meant as desirable efficiency in hotels in the Northeast “can be off-putting to some visitors,” Gatzke notes. “They see it as bad service.” Where Southern hospitality still thrives, the pace will lag the Northeast’s. “You can space things out farther here because people don’t have a problem with stopping and pausing,” adds O’Brien. “It’s okay to meander. That’s why South Beach’s Lincoln Road is thriving as a retail destination, despite the heat.”

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