Illustration by J. Darrow   (Photo: Stephen Swintek (boat); Neilson Barnard/Getty Images (DVF); Theo Wargo/Getting Images for Lincoln Center (Diller); Andrew H. Walker/Getty Images (Diller outfit))

Where other than New York can two public �figures of extraordinary renown remake an entire flank of the city into an exquisite architectural playground? In their golden years, Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg have chosen to lavish a formerly unthinkable amount of dough on Manhattan’s West Side, including a recently announced free-floating park near 14th Street, dotted with enormous trees and three performance areas. �Ten years ago, we had a really rotten waterfront on the West Side�and I do think it’s appropriate to say the West Side rather than the Lower West Side,� says Diller on a recent afternoon. �Many cities glorify being on the water! Here, the farther west you went, the crummier it got.�

Which was nothing a few hundred million couldn’t fix. Today, with their investment in both IAC and DVF’s headquarters, the High Line, the Hudson Yards’ forthcoming Culture Shed�rumored to be the new home of Fashion Week�and, now, this crazy little �Pier 55� park, Diller and von Furstenberg have reformed the look of the city’s west end. �I just love public spaces,� says Diller, mentioning a fondness extending from the �parks of New Orleans to the squares of Savannah, to the extraordinary publicness of Washington, D.C.� He likes them in an �Emersonian sense, for their peace and stillness, and �also in the other sense,� he says, �for their stimulation. A statue in a corner, a little fountain�those things bring a good feeling to people.� On the new island, there will even be a Greek amphitheater: �Early on in the process, we had a reference picture of a classic, moss-covered amphitheater,� says Diller, who worked on the project with Scott Rudin, Stephen Daldry, and George Wolfe. �And now we have one, as state of the art as can be.�

Is the park a bit of noveaux noblesse oblige in the age of Piketty’s Capital? �Somebody has to [make parks], with New York budgets,� says Diller. �I don’t know if it’s important, or part of it isn’t very important. I’m certainly not curing �cancer, and if you say, �Why don’t you spend your money on something that will save lives?’ Well, I think we do,� he says, referring to the couple’s manifold philanthropy. But to Diller, it’s worth it to be ambitious about forgotten places. �There’s a value there, in public spaces,� he says. �I know they have value to me.�