Moving day at NewsBeast

Joe Pompeo
·Media Reporter

Staffers at Tina Brown's Newsweek-Daily Beast hybrid are bidding farewell--or maybe more like good riddance!--to the makeshift workspace that the joint operation has shared for the past eight months. Brown herself was said to have blanched at the sight of the temporary digs upon first touring them last fall.

There's not much of a net gain, so far as commuter convenience is concerned. Staffers are moving from one out-of-the-way location (the bowels of Manhattan's Financial District) to another (Chelsea's subway-less far west side). But NewsBeast employees are no doubt glad to be turning their backs on the offices that had temporarily housed both sides of the shop, replete with their "dark, dingy" interiors and "filth-covered windows that block all sunlight."

Presumably they'll be able to soak up more Vitamin D at the luxe, Frank Ghery-designed IAC building overlooking the Hudson River. The Daily Beast, which was launched by IAC, was based there before moving into the provisional Newsweek digs.

Contractors have since remodeled and reconfigured the second floor space at IAC headquarters to accommodate the Newsweek family, where the on-site newsroom headcount will now total around 170. We're told that the new Newsbeast HQ boasts an open layout with offices reserved for editorial VIPs including Brown, executive editor Edward Felsenthal, managing editor Tom Weber, Newsweek International editor Tunku Varadarajan, and creative director Dirk Barnett, and that there will be a studio where reporters and editors can do TV hits. Unfortunately, the office doesn't come equipped with one of the coveted "nap rooms" where weary writers at places like the New York Times and the Huffington Post have the luxury of resting their heads between deadlines. Still, the IAC building does have a "relax room" on the ninth floor of the building, which is shared with IAC siblings such as College Humor and Vimeo.

As for any staffers who may have preferred to stay put, at least they'll get some free booze out of the deal--IAC chairman Barry Diller will host a staff-wide cocktail reception on July 13 to welcome his employees home. Here's a photo of the supposed dungeon they're leaving behind:

(Mark Lennihan/AP)