And now, Ryan Gosling helping break up a fight on Astor Place

Well, the last time we saw Ryan Gosling around here, he was helping move furniture on Seventh Street... And now, in this video making the rounds this afternoon (thanks to RyanAvenueA for sending us the link from Jezebel), watch the Oscar nominee break up some sort of skirmish on Astor Place during the weekend... he appears at about the 30-second mark...



Suppose they were fighting about the new Astor Place design?

Days of wine and ... dogs?

Oh, it's the Dog Days at Astor Wines this afternoon ... where John Marshall Mantel took these photos....

Cooper Union's plan to remake Astor Place — and the East Village

In case you haven't read it yet, head on over to Jeremiah's Vanishing New York for his take on Cooper Union's plan for Astor Place — and the East Village.

An excerpt!

The redesign of Astor Place is part of the Bloomberg program to remake the East Village into a haven for the upper classes and safety-seeking suburbanites. When considering what's about to happen to Astor Place, we must look beyond the pretty green trees to the motivations behind the plan. Why is it really being done and for whom? Who will benefit the most from it? What will the East Village lose in the long run?

Read the post here.

Previously on EV Grieve:
East Village — the new Midtown?

Jerry Delakas' Astor Place newsstand will live a little longer

[Photo via Facebook]

Jerry Delakas, operator of the iconic newsstand on Astor Place, as been given a temporary reprieve from efforts to evict him, the Post reports today. He now has until November until the city can toss him. And the fight continues.

Read more about Delakas at Jeremiah's Vanishing New York.

Tying one on at Astor Place

Yesterday, Bobby Williams spotted workers placing neon zip ties on light poles on Astor Place...

And V.H. McKenzie notes some of the final product today....

[Update] Thanks to Eric G. for letting us know that this is part of an art project from the Animus Art Collective for this year's Summer Streets program.

[Update] Two shots from EV Grieve reader Joe...

Beatbox Kid Lucky on Astor Place today

[Bobby Williams]

[John Marshall Mantel]

East Village — the new Midtown?

While we wait to learn more about the future of 35 Cooper Square, this is a good time to stop and note how vastly different this stretch of the neighborhood on the Bowery, Cooper Square and Astor Place ... from East Third Street up to East Ninth Street will look in, say, three years... Here's a recap of what's coming soon...

This summer, work is expected to start at the soon-to-be-demolished Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art building here...

As The Wall Street Journal reported , Edward Minskoff plans to build "a 430,000-square-foot tower on a site overlooking Astor Place ... Just outside the trendy East Village, it's an unorthodox location for an office building. Most of the city's modern office space is in Midtown and the Financial District."

According to the Minskoff Equities website, the 13-story mixed-use office, education and retail building is planned for Spring 2013.

Moving south...The city unveiled plans in January to dramatically reconfigure streets, parks and traffic islands around Astor Place and Cooper Union...

Here are a few images on what the space will look like...

There's a lot happening here, much of it positive. You can read coverage at Curbed ... BoweryBoogie ... The Observer has a slide show here ... The Architects Newspaper...
(The Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation has an issue with eliminating parts of Astor Place and Stuyvesant Street...)

And then there's 35 Cooper Square at Sixth Street.

Arun Bhatia hasn't made plans for the space here public. However, the developer specializes in dorms and luxury condos. So that's a safe bet.

Here's one of their recent projects at 139 Wooster...

I'm going with luxury housing here... new digs for the folks working in 51 Astor Place...

Finally, there's 347 Bowery at Third Street...

...which will one day be a 72-room boutique hotel that would look like...

So... what does all this mean? We can speculate all we want... but likely an increase in rents... which may drive out the little shops along St. Mark's Place...

... to make way for the kind of businesses catering to a new office building. So maybe a Pret A Manger, Subway, Bread Factory and a Ranch 1 for office workers ... We hope we're wrong about the possible domino effect of all the new high-end housing, hotel and office building. Perhaps this is a good time to appreciate what's still here.

City tossing longtime Astor Place newspaper vendor

From the Daily News:

A beloved newsstand vendor who has presided over Manhattan's Cooper Square for 24 years is getting tossed out like yesterday's papers.

The city is booting Jerry Delakas, 62, from a kiosk on Astor Place and Lafayette St. because he's not the legal license holder.

That decision contradicts the dying wish of the woman who held the license, happily allowed him to operate the stand and designated him as heir.

[Photo by Hagen for News via The Daily News]

Today's sign of the apocalypse: Your future gateway to the East Village!

From The Wall Street Journal today:

Edward Minskoff, a member of one of New York's storied real-estate families, is hoping to begin construction in July on what would be the city's first large "speculative" new office building since the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008.

Mr. Minskoff says he will begin construction without any pre-leasing on a Maki and Associates-designed, 430,000-square-foot tower on a site overlooking Astor Place that he acquired in late 2007. Just outside the trendy East Village, it's an unorthodox location for an office building. Most of the city's modern office space is in Midtown and the Financial District.

But in a recent interview, Mr. Minskoff predicted that the building would attract high-tech companies, investment banks, insurance and advertising firms. "It's an area that a lot of young people want to work in," he said. He plans to charge about $65 a square foot per year, a modest amount for new space.

The Journal piece came via Curbed, who note: "Though Astor Place seems like an odd location for a new office building, AOL and J. Crew already call the gateway to the East Village home." True. Construction is slated for July, with an 2013 opening date. May want to enjoy that Film Academy coffee while you can.

[Photo via Curbed]

Fake police set up real-looking command post on Astor Place

Look closely at this photo sent along by Bob Arihood. So the NYPD was camped out yesterday on Astor Place....or is it the Village Video News... ?



It's our understanding that if the NYPD sells old equipment, the new owner must remove all police markings. Also, this is a new truck. Now that the city is kinda broke, is the NYPD selling off some spare parts?

In any event, does this mean that I can toss the ticket I got for public urination from the guy at Village Video News?

Pedestrian struck by Cadillac on Third Avenue

Vautrin, a photographer whose work we have published here before, sent along these photos. As Vautrin notes, last night at 9:09, a Cadillac sedan turning from 8th Street/Astor Place onto Third Avenue struck a pedestrian in the crosswalk. Police arrived in due course. Ambulance from Beth Israel arrived very promptly. From the photo, the pedestrian appears to have suffered a lower right leg/ankle/foot injury. And the smile on the face of the ambulance attendant in the last photo may be taken as a relatively favorable sign.

[Updated] 'Major car accident' reported on Third Avenue at Astor Place

We're getting reports of a "major car accident" on Third Avenue at Astor Place. According to a tweet from @twatan, "Cab hit someone, cab's windshield is cracked."

Photo via.

More details as they become available.

Updated 8:37 p.m. From @twatan: "One major injury. Pretty sure it was a male. He wasn't moving much. Not sure who is to blame."

Revisiting the "Intimate" Sculpture for Living

News of the new 13-story office building coming some day to 51 Astor Place prompted some discussion of that other swanko building on the block — Sculpture for Living at 445 Lafayette.

I came across an ad from 2005 for the place...



Per Tropolism:

Renee Turman, Interior Designer, comments on the latest advertisement for Sculpture for Living, showing a rendering of unit 16A:

"First of all, they're open to the wide city stark naked, they have one little blanket over them, no rug under the bed, no curtains. Basically, it's an apartment before someone moves in, except they put a bed in there, with people who own no furniture and no drapery. That's just about as opposite as you can get from 'intimate'"

We would like to add that they appear to be shivering from fright. Is it the sight of the bad sealant job on the stock-shaped aluminum curtain wall, or the fact that the view, while fantastic, is utterly interfered with by the clunky segmentation of the "sculptural" shape (the master at work: another S-curve!) and the fact that their room cannot be furnished by anything except a tripod. And perhaps it's just me, but the telescope appears to be pointed inside the apartment, with the viewfinder located near the window.

Heh. Anyway, speaking of penthouses, one remains (427 days on Streeteasy!) on the market here for $12.75 million... check it out....

Says the listing: "The most exhilarating 360 degree views in town!!! This astonishing duplex penthouse has 232 linear feet of continuous floor-to-ceiling glass walls with unparalleled views of Manhattan!"

Meet the new entryway into the East Village

That long-rumored 13-story office building at 51 Astor Place designed by Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki will be a reality, pretty much. Yesterday, Curbed reported on this from a Wall Street Journal piece.

According to the Journal, 51 Astor Place, formerly the Cooper Union engineering building at St. Mark's and Third, is due to be torn down and replaced by a new office tower. Construction will start next summer, and is expected to be completed in 2013. Or so.

Guess this means no one should get too attached to the new Film Academy Cafe currently calling the former Starbucks space here home....

Things that you can read at the new Film Academy Cafe

On Astor Place. And has anyone tried their coffee?