Santa Monica, Calif.-based writer-artist-journalist Jennifer Sharpe recently revisited the East Village, where she lived in the 1990s, for the first time in seven years.
In an essay published Saturday at The 2 Star Traveler titled Is The East Village Ruined?, Sharpe writes about how she had been monitoring the neighborhood from afar.
I'd become luridly fascinated by a series of before and after photos, taken only seven years apart, highlighting some of the bigger losses. Like the way the Hebrew lettered charm of the 2nd Avenue Deli sign has been replaced by a flat Chase Manhattan Bank facade.
Sharpe says that she was prepped ahead of her arrival.
As the trip approached, I was issued warnings by friends who'd visited more recently, "Just realize, our East Village is gone," and "the whole city is pretty much a theme park for rich people now."
And then she was finally here.
Aside from the new bike lanes, nothing looked or felt much different. A few doors past the restaurant Veselka, I noticed the familiar sight of Ukranian letters on that long burgundy awning of the bar, Sly Fox. How had that place survived? And that awful Dallas BBQ restaurant with the turkey burger that once made a friend puke was still on the corner. For God's sake, how could STOMP! still be playing at the Orpheum?
I ducked into my old hardware store for some bungee cords, instinctively heading up the right aisle. The store's familiar glare of fluorescents off linoleum floors made me feel like a pause button on my former life had been released. By my LA tear-down standards, the East Village seemed cryogenically preserved. What was everyone being so melodramatic about? Exactly how little change did they expect from a living city?
She does discuss the reminders of Bloomberg's city and the crazy escalating rents.
But for the time being, Alphabet City seems to be in a golden moment. I wish the complaining locals who say the East Village is ruined would shut up long enough to appreciate what they've got while they still have it.
Read the whole essay here.
Bravo! We should celebrate the awsomness of this hood. If one finds themselves lamenting the past and thinks the East Village is ruined I would invite them to leave. No need to be here if it is so terrible. Let's make room for people that want to be here. The complaining is getting louder and louder. "Exactly how little change did they expect from a living city?"
ReplyDeleteRuined? Of course not... there should be stronger rent/lease protections so greedy SOB's don't force out long time residents and businesses .. This happening all over NYC.
ReplyDeleteIf the writer of this great piece sees this, she spelled Tompkins Square Park wrong. She wrote, Thomkins Square Park.
ReplyDeleteI've been here for the last 21 years. Things have changed. If you can't see that, I'm not sure what it is you're looking at. To be fair if you're going to compare the landscape now versus seven years ago, their may be some new buildings and some new businesses, but seven years ago the tidal wave was in full effect so in that respect things may not be that different. Try comparing to 15 years ago and tell me what you see.
ReplyDeleteChange is a part of life (and a part of living in the city), but the problem here is the RATE of change, which one might not notice if just visiting after 15 years.
ReplyDeleteI've been here since 1981 and of course the hood has changed many changes for the better but the pace of change was slow for 25 of those years unlike these past 7 years which has seen more buildings demolished, evictions of all tenants and gut renovations, a plethora of old businesses being forced out due to the tripling of rents, etc.. The explosion of sports bars has brought rowdy drunken weekends and a resort / spring break atmosphere to a place where most of us have to work our 9-5 lives. The most important overlooked fact is it will only get more bland as bank branches and national corporate chain stores and restaurants take over. I suppose this woman thinks the EV charm is still predominate and I can't blame her especially after living in prissy Santa Monica for all those years.
ReplyDeleteShe lives in California by choice, so you have to take that into account. She does make a good point "how could STOMP! still be playing at the Orpheum?" Obviously she hasn't seen the busloads of patrons being trucked in
ReplyDeleteHere here!
ReplyDeleteFinally a post about how the East Village is still living and breathing.
Yes many changes, and yes there are now trust fund kids wandering about. But show me a neighborhood (in Manhattan) that can compare to our spirit.
This should be your top post of the year EVG!
The change is here, but much remains, so a balanced perspective is helpful. The change itself is a mixture of positive (such as reduced crime) and negative (such as increased rents).
ReplyDeleteAgreed about the "awful Dallas BBQ". The smell of that place makes me nauseous every time I pass by. The sight of the "food" is just as unappealing. There is one EV spot I would be glad to see relegated to history.
- East Villager
I loved Stomp. Saw it when it first arrived and then again with a different cast. Both excellent performances. It's pure entertainment, not deep art, but truly well done.
ReplyDelete- East Villager
Appreciate what we've got while we still have it? There are less and less of those. And while we do still a very few of those, mostly the riches can afford to appreciate them. The riches come to the East Village for exactly the character and vibe that we should still appreciate. However, once they get here and the novelty runs out for the transient transplant riches, either they destroy it and replace it with whatever they were familiar with growing-up in suburbia or middle-America, or they move back to where they grew up. Just be glad she can afford to escape to L.A. Some of us are stuck here and don't have the luxury to move to lala land
ReplyDeleteWas she.her during weeknights when the bros and their sorostitutes are screaming "WOOOOOOOOO" 'til the wee hours of the morning. Did she try to "live" -- as in try to get sllep at night and have to wake-up go to work, do grocery shopping , run errands -- even for a few days? Tell me if we should appreciate whatever remains here while doing those?
She now lives in L.A. There's nothing to see in L.A., so of course she's seeing the EV from a a tourist point-of view now and a fresh pair of eyes with excitement like a child being taken to Disney World. And now that she is visiting, she's here as a tourist and NYC, esp. the EV has become a tourist destination tourists.
How long will that hardware last before it becomes another/condo/bank/froyo joint?
Try living here again and see if she'd still share this sentiment. She's being melodramatic writing this article and just wish she would just shut-up and stay in fuckin' L.A., where she belongs.
"The smell of that place makes me nauseous..." I always hold my breath. But it does seem to appeal to some people. And they all seem to love brightly colored drinks in big glasses. Never seen a face I'd recognize from the neighborhood in that place. Apparently, Lys Mykyta is now a preferred hangout for NYU or CU kids. I never patronized that place, so I don't really care either way.
ReplyDeleteThe most salient point here is that Dallas BBQ smells dreadful and is quite nauseating.
ReplyDelete7 years is not a long time. The advent of blogs has allowed areas to be documented down to the hour. Any change is reported and scrutinized. These before and after photos spanning 7 years is a joke. Take a look at photos from the 50s and you'll see change (though, mostly, you'll see many of the same buildings that are here today)
ReplyDeleteFor a place like the EV, you really need to look at change through decades. The 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s. Then you'll begin to feel what real change looks like.
I saw Penny Arcade at Joes Pub the other night and she nailed it - the city isn't being gentrified, it's being colonized.
ReplyDeleteHow un-insightful to not realize that a visit is not the same as living somewhere. Tell that to the old woman who has been to housing court 4 times in the past two years because her landlord desperately wants her out so he can rent to some kids whose parents will pay whatever the cost.
ReplyDeleteThe perspective of time is definitely powerful. The author lived here in the 1990's and thinks that she saw the real East Village! How funny is that? By then the East Village was already well on its way to an upscale hood. Go back to the 1960's and '70's if you are looking for the East Village experience. The author hasn't got a clue as to what came before when the area was...well it was the East Village.
ReplyDeleteHaving read the essay I remain unmoved.
ReplyDeleteShe has a point.
ReplyDeleteI remember reading about a guy who moved to Greenwich Village in the 1950's looking for Gatsby's glittering New York and all he found was a bunch of black-clad bohemians smoking and playing guitars and reading poetry in a few cafes.
So he moved back to wherever, having decided that Warhol and Ginsberg and Dylan were not worth his time.
That said, I can't imagine what kind of culture prevalent right now in the East Village is going to be praised in the future.
"That said, I can't imagine what kind of culture prevalent right now in the East Village is going to be praised in the future."
ReplyDeleteI'm betting on SantaCon
I guess she didn't notice the Death Star in Astor Place. After all, it's easy to miss!
ReplyDeleteI just love how this woman defines the East Village based on what stores and bars are still here or gone. Go see the bombed out remains of Mary Help of Christians and get back to me with how great you still think the "Thomkins" Square Park area is.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the biggest changes are the ones you can't see. When this woman lived here, she probably had a human being as a landlord (or at the very least a reasonably small agency type owner). My landlord is a faceless entity whose figurehead is married to a Trump. And this is the third predatory equity landlord I've had.
Santa Monica is lovely, count your own blessings.
What's with this lady and bungee cords? Who buys bungee cords on vacation or when they visit a city? Also how many times did she buy bungee cords while living here to know exactly where they are? I'd like to call the sanity/validity of this story into question.
ReplyDeleteI do wonder how well she knew/knows the neighborhood. She spelled Tompkins Square Park "Thomkins." But I agree that there are still things here to appreciate. Less. But still some things.
ReplyDeleteI am put off by this quote you pulled from her essay:
ReplyDelete"But for the time being, Alphabet City seems to be in a golden moment. I wish the complaining locals who say the East Village is ruined would shut up long enough to appreciate what they've got while they still have it."
I would rather read a piece written by someone who stayed and has seen the changes and experiences them on a daily basis, not some woman who lived her briefly not even that long ago who comes back for a vacation and proceeds to write as though she is an expert on what is happening here. She isn't and she has no idea what we are going through. Also most of us aren't lucky enough to own our apartments like her friend does. That person can sell and cash out at a high price now. Most of us rent and we can afford to leave and when we do leave we won't be making money on a real estate deal.
The best thing about this essay is the author got on the plane back to Santa Monica. Did she ever live through the gut renovation of her building while she was still living in it? Did she ask the woman sitting on the bench where she lived and what she thought? And who the hell is she to tell us what to say or do, she moved to Santa Monica after hanging out here for a few years outta college most likely. Perhaps she should have asked those of us who stayed why we do and what still is appealing about the neighborhood.
ReplyDeleteI'm not gonna give them the click for this one but if it's some kind of travel site, they never say a place is bad don't go there, right? that's not how they get paid.
ReplyDeleteHaven't read her piece yet, but just reading Grieve's post on it and anticipating the ragehatestorm to come in the comments made me LOL $5 coffee all over my keyboard.
ReplyDeleteAlphabet City is still awesome, it's true. There's plenty to complain about -- particularly the forces squeezing virtually all of the non-Masters of the Universe out of Manhattan -- but it remains a magical nabe, with much of its old charm holding fast against the tide of gentrification, just as many of our willows survived Irene and Sandy.
I don't know about Sly Fox, but one of the reasons some local favorites have managed to hang on for so long is that they own their buildings and are not susceptibility to out-of-state, predatory landlords who are scooping up property as investments. Those greedy fucks are the ones changing the fabric of the community for the worse hence banks and fro-yo as far as the eye can see.
ReplyDeleteNot as long as I'm alive! Uncle Waltie
ReplyDeleteSomeone who studied at Sarah Lawrence isn't going to understand what it is like for people who live here and don't have means and are being rolled over by the well to do college students and college grads who invade the neighborhood. She is part of the problem without realizing it and doesn't need to be telling any of us to shut up. It's disrespectful.
ReplyDeleteThis woman misses the point big-time. It's not so much that the physical look of the EV has changed, it has; but it's more that the ratio of outsiders to insiders who are using/abusing it is what has changed a great deal.
ReplyDeleteAnon 12:56 - thats the extent of their ability to communicate, either feed into their facebook echo chamber or shut up, because of course the world is here to serve them.
ReplyDeleteThe East Village isn't dead, but just like the IQ of many who now live here it has gone into remission. In the daytime some of it it still looks and feels a lot like the EV of the 60s and 70s, but it changes drastically at night and on the weekends when the drunken zombies begin their nightly rituals. In the daytime the EV is pretty relaxed and quiet, but at night it can be a bit too frenetic, and on the weekends it gets overrun with large groups everywhere.
ReplyDeleteI realized a few days ago how much it has become like Amsterdam, full of tourists looking for the next thrill, hordes of people walking everywhere. Too bad we don"t have the same liberal government policies they have over there because it feels more relaxed even with the tourists, or maybe that's just Europe where they cater to adults. Here we cater to the eternally infantile.
As crazy as the East Village has been since I moved here 25 years ago, I was always able to sleep through the night until about five years ago. It's party central now with people hollering all night. Just when I fall asleep another pack of nitwits starts screaming.
ReplyDeleteHaving not read the essay, but having lived in the East Village for over 20 years (and finally escaping a year ago), I agree with the major sentiment here: This woman should keep quiet. As most here have said, she should try living in the East Village now before she sanctimoniously tells the residents to "shut up". I began to hate the neighborhood around 2005, when my bldg (which was formerly filled with wonderful oddballs) began to be overrun with frat boys (and baby strollers). From that point on it became unbearable. As some have also said here: of course she'd still find the EV interesting, having lived in LA all those years. What's in LA? Cars? Every time I miss the city, I just look at this blog or JVNY and then I become peaceful all over again with my decision to leave. I don't need an essay from someone living in La-la Land to make me feel regretful or sorry I left.
ReplyDeleteThe neighborhood is mostly made up of rentals and landlords which suffered through years of not generating enough income to keep buildings in decent shape have cashed in and sold to mini-Trump flippers. A new breed of tenant which is highly transient now occupies these gut renovated apartments for a year or two at a time certainly not enough to grow roots in the neighborhood or really give a shit about its future. When people are not invested in a place (you can be a renter and care about your block) the community is weaker and will fall prey to developers off their leashes. The frustration many of us are expressing here goes deeper than a mom and pop shop closing after 30 years. It is the "I only want the neighborhood to serve me and the rest of it I could care less about" attitude that is all too typical of the latest wave of "neighbors" and their friends that drives us crazy. Someday the LES will look like the UES with big apartment building, department stores, etc and outside of Greenwich Village the last human scaled place to live will be gone from Manhattan. We want to slow down the conversion to bland and keep some of the spirit of the EV alive as long as possible. The neighborhood has meant a lot of things to different people but those that want to remain don't welcome those that dismiss our concerns and opinions as exaggerated or fictional.
ReplyDeleteI loved her essay. Okay, full disclosure, I'm the friend she refers to that she crashes with while she's here. But I see her point. I've been in the east village a while - although I know it can sometimes seem like a competition for who's been here the longest and therefore has the most credibility, yadda, yadda, yadda. Needless to say, I've seen the changes through the 80's and 90's and the changes that are still occurring. And a lot of them are painful - seeing places close, rents rise, these things suck. But sometimes it's important to stop bitching about what sucks and focus on what we still love. There's a reason that we've stuck around - it's a damn great neighborhood!
ReplyDeleteI love Jennifer's essay for reminding us of that.
You're her friend, what else are you going to say?
ReplyDeleteI think many issues here that people are raising go beyond "Gee, these things suck!" Hypergentrification does a little more than suck and I don't think you should ask people to "stop bitching" about increasingly predatory land-swallowers trying to take their apartments, schools, and churches just because, yay, they can still get butt-drunk at the Sly fucking Fox or whatever.
It's not a competition indeed. You and your friend both sound equally spoiled.
The East Village these days is like Bruce Springsteen these days. A decent imitation of it(him)self.
ReplyDeleteIt always cracks me up when I see the Bros and Bras cavorting on 2nd Avenue at 2:30 AM. 99% of them would have been scared to cross Broadway only a few decades ago. As always, just my 2 cents.
ReplyDeleteWhat makes someone an ev insider? how long have these folks lived here? also- I guess its OK to take shots at the bros/bras since they're white- also it takes two to tango meaning you're beloved buildings aren't being taken they're.being SOLD how much has the salvation army made in recent years? you can't swoop in and buy unless folks want to sell-wonder what the reaction would be.if a huge.number of say Koreans moved in? Oh right. its only bad when Whitey moves in
ReplyDeleteI've lived here since 1968, so am a moderately old-timey resident, and have seen change the level and awfulness of which distresses and pisses me off. I'm now the senior tenant in my building off Second Avenue, rent-controlled thank God, and have no intention of leaving except feet-first.
ReplyDeleteIt's horrible what the EV has become. I remember wonderful little mom and pop businesses up and down the avenues and on all the side streets: antique stores, fabric and trim shops lining First Avenue, bookshops, great butcher stores and fishmongers, all the things you'd need to live like a grownup. Now it's just fro-yo in a hoof and overpriced coffee drinks. Yeah, it's nice having a few decent restaurants, but we did okay for ourselves before the influx, and all the incomers turn over every six months anyway.
When I moved in, it was in the midst of elderly Ukrainian and German residents with whom we could not have had less in common. Kind of the same today, really, only the other way round. We're still the hip ones, not the hipsters...so go suck your thumbs, kids.
I'd like for the writer of that patronizing article to live in the Icon's Avenue A frat house and see if she'd still say the same thing.
ReplyDelete"whiteys" have move here then. Difference between the "whiteys" of today and then is that the "whiteys" of today are disrespectful, arrogant, have a sense of entitlement, do nothing but consume and not establish any community relationship. And that when the "whitey"'s money runs dry or another Sandy hits the neighborhood, whiteys go home to whitey mommy and daddy back to whitey Connecticut.
It's not about the race of those moving in. It's about the character and behavior and disposition of the individuals(or lack thereof) that defines a neighborhood. Sadly, mostly the self-important narcissistic and ill-mannered moneyed whiteys bros and brohos are the ones moving in the now "cryogenically preserved East Village."
Jill, you should've applied for a liquor license for Speed Bump - a "restaurant" that is an homage to the family of traffic calming devices with dishes and cocktails names such as Slow Zone and Speed Limit and the "restaurant"'s decor would have rubber speeds and speed humps and bumps in yellow and black stripes - and CB3 would have approved that application.
ReplyDeleteBut in all seriousness, this is a commendable idea, however Ave. A is high traffic area and with the proliferation of idiotic binge drinking, which often times the binge-drinkers would result in need of medical services and the rest of Wooohoooo-ers causing other incidents and accidents that'd need emergency medical services, the bumps would slow down the response time for the EMT's, firetrucks, ambulances, and NYPD (well, they never arrive anyway, unless an affluent "whitey" was in need of aid.)
"Like yah, I don't know how people are saying it changed: look right over there - the Cabrini Center Building is still here!"
ReplyDeleteWait, she initially spelled it "Thomkins" Square Park, right? Well, then, the essay has since been edited. Now it says "Tomkins." Cracking my ass up over here.
ReplyDeleteNot dead. On its deathbed. And in the immortal words of Oscar Wilde on his, "Either the wallpaper goes or I do."
ReplyDelete"Oh right. its only bad when Whitey moves in" -- it's not that long ago when a comment like this would be denigrating a different race. I guess that's some progress.
ReplyDeletebut she lives in SAnta Moinca now….why do we care what she thinks ?
ReplyDelete