Pulse: Chatter: Nightlife: The Ultimate VIP Room

Mark Marek, owner of new 17th Street bar G, is taking the concept of VIP up a notch

Time was, you knew you were among the city’s social elite if you could score a Saturday night rez at Buddakan. But now Mark Marek, owner of new 17th Street bar G (along with investors like Danny Govberg), is taking the concept of VIP up a notch with a private lounge inside his bar that’s so exclusive, most patrons don’t know it’s there. (Insert G-spot joke here.) The “Mogul Room,” an über-luxe lair with its own bar, humidors and concierge, is situated in the belly of the 10,000-square-foot G behind a set of steel doors — and a full-time bodyguard. Mogul memberships have been restricted to those who “make the city tick,” Marek says. “You have to pick your poison. You can’t be ultra-exclusive and banging every night.” While it all sounds absurd, the Mogul Room does have one virtue: Paris Hilton can’t get in.