Tourists this week may be disappointed: Construction workers put up plywood walls around Apple's iconic store at the southeast corner of Central Park, obscuring the most-Flickr'ed structure in the city. Apple plans to remove the glass panes and replace them, possibly with a smaller number of larger glass panes, as part of the revamping of the cube and plaza originally built in 2005.

The plans filed with the city were vague: "REMOVE & REINSTALL GLASS CUBE AT PLAZA. REMOVE BOLLARDS & INSTALL NEW PAVERS AT CUBE PERIMETER." This work will leave the store headless for a few weeks, as it necessitates temporary removal of the cube.

As with all Apple news, speculation abounds! 

"They are replacing the walls/roof with single panes of glasses. It’s going to be epic," a commenter writes at the blog ifoAppleStore.

"5 panes of glass (one each side and top) would be EPIC and totally in line with Apple’s unibody style," another said.

Glass is a hallmark of Apple's retail outlets--the Shanghai store features a glass cylinder, and the Soho store, which was Apple's original location in New York, a glass staircase. But the cube is iconic enough that Apple felt the need to trademark its design last year.

"Steve is behind this," another speculator chimed in. "He’s a true minimalist. Clearly they’re going to reduce the number of glass panes. Maybe not down to 5 but we can only hope." Emphasis Betabeat's.