Barfin' at the Coop: The Serial Vomiter strikes again

We're hesitant to write anymore about this ongoing atrocity versus architecture... However, it is our duty to file this report... As we worldwide exclusively reported last Friday, someone in recent weeks has turned the new Cooper Union academic building into his or her own private vomitorium... We hoped that these were merely isolated incidents, perhaps... perhaps just an extra vicious pub crawl, extended game of flip cup or soapy batch of McSorley's...

No. The Vomitrator is getting dangerous, empowered by the publicity we so willingly heaped upon this sick individual.

As seen Sunday morning...



And, for any of you skeptics who thinks that the Yeti is a myth or believes that balding comes from your mom’s side (or wearing hats), here is further evidence that someone (or thing) is chundering on the Coop... the outline of previous puking sessions as seen here in Exhibits A through E:







We're curious what will happen next. Will the Cooper Union beef up security, particularly after happy hour? Or will The Vomitrator be free to strike again? Given the number of bars/tourists/students in this region, can anything stop The Vomitrator?

The Telephone Bar hangs it up

As I first reported on Jan. 13, The Telephone Bar & Grill on Second Avenue near Ninth Street, an EV mainstay the last 22 years, was closing at the end of the month... there was an "end of the era" farewell Sunday night for regulars...and today, the bar was papered over...awaiting its new tenant, something from the owner of Down The Hatch, among others...

My post on Jan. 13 solicted several reader comments...an outpouring that took me by surprise...

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Telephone Bar and Grill closing after 22 years

What's coming to The Telephone Bar space? Some fratty debauchery, perhaps

Price cutting atop Kiehl's

In early December, we wrote about 203 E. 13th St. #PH4B, the rooftop pad on Third Avenue above Kiehl's...it's a fine looking home that was going for $1.265 million.




Well, thank God that you didn't buy it then.

Why?

Last Thursday, the owners slashed the price by $200,000 (16 percent) to $1,065,000. With that money you just saved, you can buy some shampoo at Kiehl's.

The official listing is here. Streeteasy has some history.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Speaking of rooftops: 'Own a piece of history in this boutique condo Penthouse of the historic Kiehl's Building'

Alexander Wang launches ad campaign for his new anti-itch powder

On 12th Street at Third Avenue.

Oh! It's his T line. Per BlackBook:

[H]e's making quite a statement with his first-ever ad campaign for his lower-priced line T. "The energy was much more appropriate for something like guerrilla marketing than anything too proper or formal," Wang says of the ads which will only grace NYC sidewalks, not the pages of the magazines currently stocked at your local newsstand.

Things that I wish I hadn't read: Katz's corned beef sandwich has 4,490 milligrams of sodium

Which is the same amount as 10 McDonald's hamburgers. (The New York Times via Grub Street)

[Image via]

EV Grieve Etc: Mourning Edition

Ice cream spilled during Avenue A donnybrook Saturday night (Neither More Nor Less)

Thoughts on living in Fishbowl City (Flaming Pablum)

Another vanishing: Aphrodisia Herb Shoppe on Bleecker (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Town Hall on future of Chinatown tonight (Save the Lower East Side!)

Someone using the Pee Phone to make an actual phone call (East Village Corner....Musings by Melanie)

A Meatpacking District Now and Then (Greenwich Village Daily Photo)

Spotting a T-Rex on East Houston (BoweryBoogie)

Is America's greatest family moving to the East Village?

We're still reeling from the feature in yesterday's Post on the superduperfaboo Novogratz family...

After reading this, you may want to move to, say, Greenland. Or someplace where aren't TVs. And we pretty much have to excerpt the entire article:

Two gorgeous, self-taught downtown designers with seven young urban kids are set to become Manhattan's next reality-TV stars. Think "Jon & Kate Plus 8" meets "Sex and the City."

Artsy downtown couple Bob and Cortney Novogratz, who gut-renovate dilapidated city buildings and transform them into multimillion-dollar homes, are set to star in "9 by Design," a Bravo reality show premiering April 5 that chronicles their chaotic Manhattan life where real estate is the constant family drama.

Their shenanigans could make Bob and Cortney the latest New Yorkers you love to hate -- with some viewers likely to be outraged by the manic couple's constant uprooting of their kids, and others embracing them as the coolest and most photogenic TV parents since Mrs. Partridge and Billy Ray Cyrus.

Cameras follow the nomadic Novogratz clan -- they've moved more than 15 times within a five-mile radius -- as Bob and Cortney scramble to find a temporary apartment in one day after renting out their mansion at 5 Centre Market Place in SoHo.

They check out a $14,000-a-month East Village rental and briefly consider renting out an old bar where they would bathe their newborn in the urinal. They eventually settle on a two-bedroom apartment where all the kids have to share a 12 x 14 bedroom.

During the eight-episode season, Cortney gives birth, the couple builds their first boutique hotel on the Jersey Shore, and designs a private gym in Hoboken, NJ, a beach house in Amagansett and a townhouse in the East Village.

"We wanted to show off New York City like 'Sex and the City' did," said Bob, 46, who is filmed scooting around SoHo on his Vespa with his pregnant wife on the back of the bike.

"Building in the city is stressful," said Cortney, 38. "People can relate to moving whether they've moved once or as many times as we have. We've lost track of how many times we've moved over the past 17 years." Twice, the family has moved three times in one year.

The chronic flippers live in their homes while renovating, then sell them and move on to their next project.

The family currently lives in a five-bedroom, 8,000-square-foot townhouse at 400 West St., where they've built an indoor basketball court for the kids. But Bob and Cortney are already getting bored; they've listed the property for just under $20 million and are eyeing a move to the East Village.

"The kids may end up in therapy," Bob jokes on the show. Indeed, the couple actually named their fifth child "Five."

The Novogratz kids, Wolfgang, 12; twins Bellamy and Tallulah, 11; Breaker, 9; twins Five and Holleder, 4, and Major, 1, attend three different schools.

Meanwhile, as you may know, work continues at 238 E. Fourth St. between Avenue A and Avenue B where the former one-level construction company was razed to become a BoCoNo-designed $4 million penthouse.



Previously on EV Grieve:
A Manhattan family that intrigues, intimidates and nauseates

[Photo via]

Washed up: Butcher Bay calls it a day

The long, expensive saga of Seymour Burton/Butcher Bar on East Fifth Street between Avenue A and Avenue B has apparently come to a close... the space is for lease...




A quck refresher on this fish eatery that opened last February:

After The former Le Tableau space closed in December 2007 and became Seymour Burton... there were gut renovations, menu changes, new chefs and CB3 lawsuits...the restaurant closed in November with the following note:



"...closed temporarily to write our memoirs..."

Where donuts were once served, a grocery store opens

From the Department of That Was Really *&%$##@@* Fast... The corpse of Dunkin' Donuts is still warm and, possibly, a little glazey...and on Second Avenue, the first of the two shops have opened in DD's old space... a deli/grocery...




Jeremiah first had the news of DD's split future... Meanwhile, some folks are still in mourning... from Let's Do This Instead (via Eater):

It would sound strange that I’d think the biggest loss in the East Village would be a Dunkie’s. But the one on Second Ave. between 10th and 11th was one of the nicest neighborhood amenities ever. Where else could you sit on the sidewalk with free wifi, or at a counter by their picture windows in winter, and look out onto one of the oldest buildings in New York City, St. Mark’s Church (built in 1799, and just imagine everything it has seen grow up around it for over two centuries).

Previously on EV Grieve:
Dunkin' Donuts closes on Second Avenue; only 428 left in NYC

Dunkin' Donuts Week in Review

New scaffolding reaching to the heavens at St. Brigid's

At Eighth Street and Avenue B.

Previously.

The Cooper Square Hotel's new dining option opens Saturday

Workers have removed the paper on the windows on the former lobby bar at the Cooper Square Hotel...




As Eater reported, the space will be for a "casual cafe"...and we were told this past weekend that it opens Saturday...

Boutique on Bowery possibly opening today; new lease signs appear at 52E4

Boutiques on Bowery is slated to open today in the retail space in 52E4, the 15 stories of condo on the Bowery near Fourth Street... The BOB Web site confirms that the store opens today... The site also lists the hours from Tuesday through Sunday...meaning they likely wouldn't be open today, Feb. 1, on a Monday....

Anyway! With this opening comes the arrival of new "prime retail space available" signs at 52E4...Perhaps something more permanent is coming here some day?

"How to Make it in America" debuts Feb. 14

As you may recall from last fall... the new HBO series "How to Make it in America" has been filming all over the neighborhood... And now, posters are up advertising the show's debut on Feb. 14...



I don't have HBO, so you'll have to let me know how it is...

Somewhere on Second Avenue

Avenue A, 10:12 a.m., Jan. 31

Why people in L.A. might be talking about McSorley's today

The Los Angeles Times published a feature today about Geoffrey Bartholomew, the poet bartender who has worked behind the bar at McSorley's since 1967. Bartholomew is the author of the 2001 release "The McSorley Poems." (He has an MA in from City College, where in the '70s "he tutored under literary heavyweights Kurt Vonnegut and Anthony Burgess.") The piece talks about some of the bar's history and current group of regulars... nothing all that interesting for us hereabouts, but far more fascinating for L.A. bargoers, who think Backstage Bar & Grill in Culver City is the best dive bar.

Spotting an artwork ad on a cab

Thirty days into the month yesterday... I finally spotted one of the new art ads atop the ads...(the one on the right)



As the Times reported back in December:

[F]or the month of January, Show Media, a Las Vegas company that owns about half the cones adorning New York City’s taxis, has decided to give commerce a rest. Instead, roughly 500 cabs will display a different kind of message: artworks by Shirin Neshat, Alex Katz and Yoko Ono.

Previously on EV Grieve:
But how will we know what reality show to watch or strip club to hit?

Art show at the Mars Bar: Your chance to show off your "priceless masterpieces"

Tomorrow at 2. I'll be bringing my velour cats playing poker wall tapestry



[Feline Frenzy at the Poker Table via]

Times writes about White Slab Palace: Mentions David Schwimmer, but no falling moose/caribou dead animal head

The Times writes about White Slab Palace on Delancey and Allen today....

And let's start the piece:

THE Lower East Side has become a destination for those from other boroughs, other towns and other nations who seek a few hours of Manhattan life. On a recent Saturday night, on Rivington Street between Essex and Ludlow, it was easy to find people from Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, England and Germany. It was harder to find a local resident.

Nearby, a stretch limousine idled, its passenger area illuminated by a black light and filled with champagne glasses. Inside, Luis Salcedo, the driver, waited for his evening’s charges — eight people from Queens. Mr. Salcedo said he was often called to drive to the area. “They always sing songs on the way,” he added.

And!

“The greasy dude factor is low here,” said Sam Sellers, one of the resident D.J.’s. “You can play reggae and the guys aren’t grinding up all over the girls. It’s parties of friends, not one or two or three people looking for a night, so the energy is amazing.”

Celebrity sighting bonuse: David Schwimmer!



Anyway, stretch limos, greast dudes...yes, yes... But, oddly enough, no mention of the falling caribou/moose/dead animal head here!

Previously on EV Grieve:
Field & Stream FINALLY checks in on the falling moose head/caribou story; tsk-tsks entire New York media

Welcome to the Jungle

Sorry about the shit quality.

Opening tonight: Bar Above Cabin, purveyors of "oysters and burgers and rock and roll"

Just when we were speculating about the new bar opening in the old Pizza Shop space next to Niagra on Avenue A...comes this report from Urban Daddy about the new Bar Above Cabin, which (soft) opens tonight:

Here's what you need to know: it's a bar opening on the hush-hush. It used to be a small, nondescript pizza shop. And it now deals in oysters and burgers and rock and roll. On top of a speakeasy. Rest easy knowing that the speakeasy, Cabin Down Below, is still alive and dealing in hipsters, loud music and strong cocktails. But in place of mozzarella and red sauce, upstairs you'll find exposed brick, tufted black leather banquettes, an old chandelier or two and just enough light to see Agyness Deyn sitting in the corner.

This Little Piggy Had Roast Beef...and Pizza

Per Grub Street:

The people behind This Little Piggy Had Roast Beef at the former Birdies space on First Avenue "is the brainchild of Artichoke’s Francis Garcia and Sal Basille."

Sixth Street's Congregation Mezritch Synagogue spared from glassy fate?

This just in from the The Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation (GVSHP)...

NYS Historic Preservation Office, in response to an application from GVSHP, has ruled that the Congregation Mezritch Synagogue on Sixth Street between Avenue A and First Avenue qualifies for listing on the State and National Register of Historic Places. As the GVSHP notes, "While State and National Register listing does not prevent demolition of historic buildings, it does offer tax breaks and other financial incentives for preservation of historic structures."

Per an e-mail from the GVSHP:

The 1910 Congregation Mezritch Synagogue is the East Village’s last operating ‘tenement synagogue,’ so called because they occupied narrow tenement-sized lots and served residents of the surrounding tenements. This striking neo-classical style structure was supposed to be demolished in 2008 when GVSHP and the East Village Community Coalition staged public protests to save it and called upon the LPC to landmark the building. While the LPC did not, following the protests the developer of the condo which would have replaced the building backed out of the deal. The building was saved temporarily, but its ultimate fate is far from clear. GVSHP is completing a historic resources survey of the entire East Village, which will allow us to make strong arguments and recommendations for landmark protections throughout the East Village.

For further reading:
Proposed New East Village Synagogue Looks Suspiciously Like Apartment Building

"The Perfect Crime" at Bullet Space

City Room checks in with a piece on "The Perfect Crime,” the exhibit that Andrew Castrucci organized at Bullet Space on East Third Street.

From the article:

The show, up through this weekend and featuring more than 200 artists and 300 works, is part retrospective of the experience of squatting and part history of the building and the people it has housed, including both squatters and unknown inhabitants from previous centuries who left traces of their lives hidden behind walls or buried in the ground outside. Mr. Castrucci said he was motivated in part by a desire to document what had in some ways been a secret existence.

Later:

By many measures life is now less arduous, Mr. Castrucci said, but he still relishes the independence and freedom he and others found in the pre-gentrified days of the East Village, when it seemed for a while that the future could be written by anybody bold enough to act.

“We were a mixture of volunteers and dropouts from society” he said. “And I still haven’t figured out what category I was in.”

I've seen the exhibit...and highly recommend it... : “The Perfect Crime,” at Bullet Space, 292 East 3rd Street. Through this weekend. Friday: 3 to 7 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, 1 to 6 p.m. Suggested donation $10.

Jill wrote about it here.

The Villager profiled it here.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Bullet Space is the first of the former LES squats to take over ownership of building from city

[Photo of Bullet Space from 1986 by Sebastian Schroder via the Bullet Space site]

EV Grieve Etc: Mourning Edition

(Above: Second Avenue at St. Mark's Place)

Blogging Manhattan's landmarks (The Masterpiece Next Door)

CBGB Radio is on the air (This Ain't the Summer of Love)

J. D. Salinger’s New York (The New York Times)

Rickshaw Spidey returns (Neither More Nor Less)

An appreciation of "Metropolitan" (Nonetheless)

NYC's best blogs (The Village Voice)

A better title for "Here is New York" (Patell and Waterman’s History of New York)

Skyline's bookstore cat finds a home (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Friday food videos (With Leftovers)

Antique signs of the LES (BoweryBoogie)

Lady GaGa is apparently popular (The Wall Street Journal)

Can you pick her out of the lineup?



[AP Photo/Evan Agostini via.]

Is a serial vomiter targeting the new Cooper Union building?

First, I apologize for this photo.

However! In the name of crackpot conspiracies news!

In the last month or so, I've walked by the new Cooper Union academic building and have noticed that someone had, well, barfed in the shadows at least six different times, usually on Friday, Saturday or Sunday mornings (duh) .... the first few times, well, ok, chuck it up chalk it up to its proximity to an ample number of students, tourists and bars...but after the fifth time, this is a trend.



There are many places to vomit in the neighborhood. Like in the bathroom at McSorley's. Or on the F train. Or my front steps. Why here so many times? Does someone have an issue with the new building? Is it just an inviting place to yak? Or, worse, after this neighborhood has had to deal with the Penistrator, is a Vomitrator now on the loose?