Norah Jones's window plan irks neighbors

NEW YORK, Dec. 2 (UPI) -- New York's Cobble Hill Association says it is fighting singer Norah Jones's plan to install 10 new windows in her 19th-century mansion.

The New York Post said some of Jones's neighbors are complaining the star's decorator sought and received local and city approval to put three double-hung windows on a formerly windowless side of her building earlier this year, then added seven more to the plan without further permission.

The neighborhood association contends there are at least 70 houses in the Cobble Hill Historic District that also have windowless walls and the group says it is concerned that if Jones is allowed to go through with her plan, other homeowners may follow, thus changing the area's aesthetic on a large scale.

Jones, on the other hand, has insisted the windows would not be "out of character" for the neighborhood.

"(The renovations are) completely inconsistent with the character of the Cobble Hill Historic District, especially for early 19th-century structures of this kind," Roy Sloane, the president of the Cobble Hill Association, told the Post, adding he thinks Jones's celebrity may have influenced the Landmarks Preservation Commission's decision.

The commission denied the allegation, the newspaper said.