Grant Shaffer's NY See

Here's the latest NY See panel, East Village-based illustrator Grant Shaffer's observational sketch diary of things that he sees and hears around the neighborhood and NYC ...  

Exclusive: Iconic East Village venue The Pyramid Club will not be reopening after year-long PAUSE

Text and photos by Stacie Joy

The Pyramid Club, a defining venue of the East Village scene in the 1980s, will not be reopening, another iconic NYC establishment to shut down as a result of the pandemic.

Having photographed a lot of events and personalities at The Pyramid Club over the years (including the Harley Flanagan and the Cro-Mags, Lydia Lunch and various anniversary parties), I was crushed to learn that the venue at 101 Avenue A between Sixth Street and Seventh Street would not be reopening after COVID-19 restrictions ease.

Opening in 1979, The Pyramid ushered in an era of “socially-conscious drag performance, led by the likes of the Lady Bunny, Lypsinka and RuPaul,” as Village Preservation once put it. In an oral history of the space, Tricia Romano noted: “[The Pyramid] served as a safe haven for freaks, geeks, weirdos, queers, and dreamers to come together and create. Sometimes it was bad; sometimes it was beautiful. But it was never boring.”

The club continued to attract an audience with a variety of dance parties and themed nights, such as Friday I’m in Love.

Manager Maria Narciso and her fiancé, general manager and house DJ TM.8 (aka Quirino Perez), met me outside the venue yesterday to talk to me about the closure, why it happened and what their plans are going forward.

The Pyramid Club, after 40-plus years, has closed. What happened Maria?

The Pyramid Club closing is another consequence of COVID-19. Once we heard that COVID-19 had reached NYC, we immediately decided to close to keep our staff and patrons safe. In doing so, we became the first NYC business to close. March 7, 2020, was the last time our doors were open to the public. 

No one expected this “Pause” to last more than a year. While many businesses were allowed to open with heavy restrictions, nightclubs and performance venues/theaters have suffered the most. With no relief in the near future, or clear requirements/restrictions for reopening, not to mention the loss of being shuttered over a year, The Pyramid Club owners decided to close. 

Can you speak a bit about how things have unfolded over the past year? Would you say this is solely COVID-related? Did you have hopes of reopening? 

Quirino and I never doubted that The Pyramid Club would reopen. Throughout 2020, and as recently as two weeks ago, we’ve worked on plans to reopen. We reached out to friends in the community to provide food we could sell at the venue, even considered purchasing tables and chairs to place in six-foot squares on the dance floor, among other options, but we were never granted permission to present our plans.

When and how were you notified about the closure?

After many months of asking the owners about their reopening plans and always getting the same answer, “we’re not ready, yet” and knowing that now we had a date from NYS/NYC to open on April 2, Quirino asked once again and received a text message reply stating that due to COVID-19, The Pyramid Club will not reopen. 

Any chance another owner might take over the space/name? Do you know what the landlord might be planning for the space?

For decades, managers have run The Pyramid Club with unfortunately very little communication from the owners. We don’t know what their plans are, as they are very private people and rarely, if ever, talk about their business plans with us. 

You and Quirino have been hosting DJ sets on Twitch. How have those gone? Do you think there’s still a market for what the Pyramid offers?

We have worked really hard this past year to keep our community intact, close, and have grown our audience throughout this Pause. During the tougher months in 2020, when so many people became sick and we all experienced so much loss, we came together, grieved together, and supported one another in our livestream chats, while DJ TM.8 kept everyone’s mind off what was going on outside their homes.

Our community is strong and resilient: we’re survivors, and The Pyramid spirit will live on. The Pyramid Club is not just a building, it’s an energy, a vibe, and it lives inside of all us. 

How do you feel about being a part of such an iconic East Village venue?

DJ TM.8 has been with The Pyramid Club family for more than 37 years. They were his first and only employer since he began working in his teens. He started washing dishes at their restaurants, became a barback at many of their now-closed nightclubs — including The Bank — and discovered his passion for music while working at The Pyramid Club, where he taught himself how to use the necessary equipment. 

He worked his way up from dishwasher/barback to GM and now he is recognized worldwide. It has truly been an honor to have been part of this legendary NYC landmark. He’s very appreciative and humbled to have been given such an opportunity and responsibility. 

I have always been a people person, and planning events was something I’ve done as a hobby over the years. When I met Quirino, and became part of his team, I was able to do what I love and organize events every week. 

Always a 1980s music lover, The Pyramid Club seemed like a perfect match for me. Assisting him these past five years, and being employed by The Pyramid Club has had its ups and downs, but it’s been overall rewarding. You can’t put a price on friendships, and I’m grateful for the many wonderful friends we’ve made while working there.

You mentioned that you and DJ TM.8 are taking your party (or parties!) to DROM on Saturday nights? Is this a Pyramid revival? What are the plans for this new venue and location? 

Because we had no response from the owners for a long while, we looked for venues for booking DJ TM.8 until The Pyramid Club was able to open. Now, with the news of The Pyramid Club not opening, we are excited to announce that we have found a permanent home for DJ TM.8’s events. The Rapture Dark ’80s and Obsession Friday will take place at Eris in Williamsburg and Temptation Saturday will take place at DROM. Details and dates to be announced soon. 

What are your plans going forward, and how can people keep in touch? 

It has been an honor to serve our East Village community at this NYC landmark. We have continued to grow our worldwide community started by the original Pyramid management and patrons. We owe them so much for building that strong foundation. 

Together with all the promoters and events: Defcon NYC Industrial, No Return Post Punk Society, DJ Rob Xtian, Occulture, and Friday I’m in Love, we will carry on and continue to be there for our community. 

We will eventually change the name of our social media pages, but for the moment, we’d encourage everyone to follow us on Instagram and Facebook, plus DJ TM.8 on Twitch.

The Pyramid Club means so much to so many and many have created beautiful memories here. We truly wish we could do something to change what has happened, but we cannot. The Pyramid spirit is inside all of us though and will live on! 

Sales: 'Unique and endless' possibilities for this unique church on 4th Street

Through the years we've written about one of the most unique properties around — the San Isidoro y San Leandro Western Orthodox Church of Hispanic Mozarabic Rite at 345 E. Fourth St. between Avenue C and Avenue D.

Well, it's for sale ... again. Curbed first took notice of the new listing (and photos!). 

Per the listing at Leslie J. Garfield:

The possibilities are unique and endless at 345 East 4th Street. The property is currently configured as a former religious assembly space with 30' ceilings on the main floor, a mezzanine space, and an owner's apartment above. Delivered vacant and outside a historic district, with a total of 9,232 buildable SF, this property offers the opportunity to create a large community facility or a residential single-family home. The property presents a unique opportunity for a developer or an end user.

If you don't have the $5 million asking price, then it's also for lease. 

The property was originally listed in the fall of 2017 with a $6 million price tag. Per the listing at the time: "A new development (of 9,232 SF) could be residential single family/multi-family or Community Facility." There were air rights too.

According to public records, Patricio Cubillos Murillo (there are several variations of this name) is the building's owner, with a deed dating to September 1975. The document on file with the city shows that this building changed hands for $6,000 that year. His nephew is now said to be in charge of the property.

Here are two pics via the new listing...

And some history via Curbed:

It was built in 1892 for the Church of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, which served the Slovak and Hungarian immigrant communities. In 1918, the building became a Russian Orthodox Church (the white-painted wrought iron entrance gate still has a crest with a double-headed eagle), and finally in 1975, a Western Orthodox Catholic Church that sought to practice Mozarabic liturgy, which was used by Christian communities living under Arab rule in early-Medieval Iberia (now Spain and Portugal). The Mozarabic Rite, also called the Hispanic Rite, is extremely uncommon outside of Spain.

The city declined to landmark the building a few years back.

There's hope that an arts organization might take it over... or the new owner could knock it down and build up using the 4,700 square feet in unused air rights.

The building to the east of the church recently sold. The former community center will be converted into residential use.

Previously on EV Grieve:
• Unique 4th Street church on the market for development

Openings: Cadence debuts on 7th Street

Cadence, the latest vegan entry in Ravi DeRossi's Overthrow Hospitality group, debuted last night at 122 E. Seventh St. between Avenue A and First Avenue. (First mention here.)

As Florence Fabricant reports at the Times, the chef, Shenarri Freeman, "is interpreting the Virginia Southern and soul food of her youth through a contemporary plant-based lens."

And...

Here, a compact dining room with a chef's counter and seating outdoors are the backdrop for Ms. Freeman's smoked grits with torched oyster mushrooms, a black-eyed pea and garlic pancake, maple buttermilk cornbread, stuffed collards with Aleppo rice, roasted purple yams with blackberry coulis and toasted marshmallows, and a seasonal fruit cobbler. Plant-based stand-ins are used in place of real dairy, as in the ice cream for the cobbler and the rosemary butter on the grits.

Cadence is currently open for limited indoor and curbside dining. Hours: Wednesday-Saturday 5-11 p.m., and Sunday from noon-10 p.m. You can find the menu (and make reservations) at this link.

Image via @cadence.newyork

Coming soon: bagels at 105 E. 9th St.

Updated: A good point in the comments... this all might be just to show up the potential for a tenant... and isn't necessarily going to be a new bagel place...

Noting the recent arrival of bagel signage over at 105 E. Ninth St. between Third Avenue and Fourth Avenue. (First post on this in November.) 

Not sure at the moment what the business will be called... there are three signs in total: Bagel Deli, Everything Bagel and (gulp) Toasted Bagel. 

The sign with Toasted Bagel is also odd as it includes what looks like two slices of bread in the form of a sandwich, which isn't a toasted bagel. Anyway!

Yuba, the 9-year-old Japanese restaurant, closed here last summer as business dwindled during the pandemic.

6 posts from March

A mini month in review... with a photo from Tompkins Square Park by Derek Berg... 

• A walk around inside the long-abandoned — and ghoulishly beautiful — P.S. 64 (March 25) 

• A visit to First Avenue Laundry Center (March 23) 

•  RIP Julian Baczynsky (March 12) 

• Frank Prisinzano planning grocery concept near Lil' Frankie's on 1st Avenue (March 9) 

• The Union Square Food Emporium looks to be closing at the end of May (March 4) 

• East River community group gets action on the release of (heavily redacted) value engineering study (March 2)

Protect the Asian Community

As seen outside the Ninth Street and Avenue B entrance to Tompkins Square Park... photo yesterday by the East Village Community Coalition ...

Remembering Carol Joyce on 7th Street

This plaque arrived last week outside 39 E. Seventh St., the longtime home (1963-2020) of Carol Joyce and her husband Bob here between Second Avenue and Cooper Square ...

"In Loving Memory of the Mayor of Seventh Street."

She's remembered here as "anti-establishment, outspoken, compassionate & witty."

In the early days of the pandemic last March, she and her husband stayed at a cousin's country home. While away from the city she died of cardiac arrest on March 22, 2020. She was 93.

Jonathan Ned Katz, a longtime friend, wrote an essay about Carol at OutHistory.org.

She was born in the Bronx on April 1, 1926 ... and later graduated from Washington Irving High School. 

Carol taught textile design for many years at the School of Visual Arts, and she wrote several books on the topic. 

Here are few a excerpts from the essay:

Carol spent her adult life in Lower East Side rentals. In the 1980s, she and Robert Joyce founded the E. 7th Street Block Association which had trees planted, increased street safety and garbage pick-ups, and brought neighbors together at street fairs. Carol fought against gentrification, sometimes winning long battles to keep the heights of new buildings scaled to the neighborhood and protecting old brownstones from being demolished for high rises. 

And...

I always viewed Carol with a bit of awe, as a wondrous, fantastical creature, a quintessential New York character. Bob Joyce said it this way, recalling his wife as "a New Yorker born and bred, with no tolerance for hypocrisy..." 

Her only shortcomings, he noted, were that "she did not drink wine or eat pasta." He called her "the love of my life."

You can read the full essay here. Bob Joyce is now living upstate with relatives. 

Thank you to Dinky Romilly for the photos! 

Your chance to laugh and support the Sixth Street Community Center

Sixth Street Comedy returns on Thursday, April 8 ... and once again, the shows will serve as a fundraiser for the Sixth Street Community Center between Avenue B and Avenue C. 

Last year, the shows organized by the East Village-based Lil Fish Productions raised $4,000 for the Community Center...

Here's info about the Community Center's current financial situation:

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed significant challenges that acutely threaten the survival of the 42-year-old organization. The Sixth Street Community Center is in a unique situation where the organization owns the building that houses their programs, and they are saddled with monthly mortgage payments that they have been unable to keep up with while trying to support basic expenses for staff and programs. 

Unfortunately, mortgage moratoriums are not effective in keeping their mortgage collectors at bay. Unlike other small community-based organizations that have shuttered their doors during the pandemic, Sixth Street Community Center has kept our doors wide open to address the unprecedented levels of food insecurity that our community is facing. 

We are very proud that we were able to pivot our work to organize and launch a free emergency food distribution, which has been operating to serve over 400 families weekly for nine months since April. Through supportive partnerships with emergent mutual aid groups and a steady team of volunteers, we've also been using our Center's kitchen to cook over 2,000 meals a week, which are provided at no cost to homeless and food-insecure individuals and families across the Lower East Side, East Village, East Harlem, and Queens. Since the onset of COVID, we have supported over 16,000 families through our food access work. 

You can find the ticket info and list of performers at this link. (Keep in mind there is very limited capacity. And masks are required.) Follow @lilfishproductions on Instagram for more updates on shows.

EXPG Studio is closing on 2nd Avenue

After six-plus years at 27 Second Ave., the Exile Professional Gym (EXPG) is closing effective today. 

The dance and performance studio here between Second Street and Third Street had been offering virtual classes during the pandemic.

In an announcement about the closure, management said that they invested in cleaning and made their best effort to reopen. "However, unfortunately, there is still no prospect of resuming to normal operation."

While this outpost has permanently closed, their L.A.-based branch will remain in business. 

Prior to the dance studio, this space was home to Second on Second, a karaoke bar.

Tuesday's parting shot

EVG contributor Stacie Joy spotted this thank-you note — written on a Whole Foods bag — on Second Avenue at Fourth Street... the note is dated Friday. 

It reads in part: "To the kind person who loaned me money at Whole Foods last night. I want to repay you, but I've lost your name and phone number." 

The letter writer then says the manager (Mahanie???) has an envelope with the money at Nomad at Second Avenue. 

"Thank you again and tell Mahanie to call me if you'd like to have a drink."

Afternoon conure break

As seen today outside the the Sixth Street and Avenue B Community Garden ... thanks to Steven for the photo...

At the first Pinc Louds show of 2021 in Tompkins Square Park

Saturday saw the return of Pinc Louds to Tompkins Square Park.

The band's eclectic, freewheeling live shows in the Park were a bright spot during the pandemic summer of 2020. 

EVG contributor Stacie Joy shared these shots from the crowd...

Also on the bill Saturday: Local talent Dirty Circuit and Ayla.

1st sign of new-building construction on the northeast corner of Avenue C and Sixth Street

Preliminary work is underway in the long-vacant lot on the northeast corner of Sixth Street and Avenue C... an excavator is now on the scene... and someone discarded all of the contents that had been stored on the property ...

As we reported on Oct. 19, there are approved permits for a 6-floor building with 11 residential units, a storefront and space for an unspecified community facility. 

And as a reminder, here's a look at the rendering for the new structure...

There has been development talk for this lot dating to 2003. A former gas station, this corner has been vacant since the early 1980s. 

Previously on EV Grieve:

• At the Heap of Ruins Garden Party

• This is the new building slated for the corner of 6th Street and Avenue C

This week in East Village TV shoots

The NBC series "The Blacklist" makes a return to the neighborhood today...  the FBI show starring Megan Boone and James Spader — now in its eighth year — has filmed in and around Tompkins Square Park multiple times through the years (2014 ... 2017).

Signage today points to a shoot around (or in?) the Park... with production vehicles parked on parts of Seventh Street, Eighth Street, Ninth Street and 10th Street.

Also returning this week... "Russian Doll" (still going as "Black Gumball" on film notices)... looks to be filming in multiple locations... with notices up along several streets and avenues... including in and around St. Nicholas of Myra Orthodox Church on 10th Street and Avenue A... 

... whose exterior doubled as Maxine's apartment building, where the party never stopped. 

Aside from "The Blacklist" and "Russian Doll," here are the other TV shoots around here in 2021:

• "FBI" 

• "New Amsterdam"

• "Pose"

Activity at the former Khyber Pass

There has been activity in recent days over at 34 St. Mark's Place ... the former Kyber Pass here between Second Avenue and Third Avenue...

Not sure at the moment what's happening with the space. Permits point to some plumbing work.

The Afghani restaurant that dated to the mid-1980s quietly closed during the pandemic. (Reported here in June.) Given its longevity on the block, some readers felt as if Khyber Pass deserved more press following its closure.

The storefront is currently for rent. 

Thanks to Steven for the photos!

Greenwich Marketplace debuts on 4th Avenue

Greenwich Marketplace is now open at 120 Fourth Ave. at 12th Street... (coming-soon coverage here).

An EVG reader ducked his head inside the door and reports finding the usual corner market offerings with a larger-than-average deli counter serving up a variety of sandwiches, wraps, paninis and salads as well as breakfast items (omelettes, French toast, egg sandwiches, etc)... and not to mention smoothies and fresh juice.

There are also geographically friendly names on the menu, such as the NYU Wrap featuring grilled chicken, mozzarella cheese, onions, lettuce, tomatoes and avocado ($9.49). You can find the menu at Seamless.

The previous tenant, the PokéSpot, officially closed this past summer after four years. Before that, we had a Subway (sandwich shop) here.

Subway Dreams on 2nd Street

NYC-based illustrator Peach Tao has a new mural up on Second Street at First Avenue (outside the First Avenue Laundry Center).

There are a lot of details in the mural ... including a tribute to the Asian grandmother in San Francisco who fought back against someone randomly attacking her...

EVG contributor Stacie Joy shared these photos of the work in progress late last week...

In the summer of 2019, Peach helped paint a new sign at Ray's Candy Store on Avenue A.

A sneak peek at the new C&B space

As we reported on Dec. 2, C&B chef-owner Ali Sahin is expanding his cafe into the vacant retail space — the former dry cleaners — next door here at 178 E. Seventh St. between Avenue A and Avenue B.

The other day, Ali gave EVG contributor Stacie Joy a sneak peek at the under-renovation storefront...

Ali hopes to have it up and running in about a month. The larger C&B will not have indoor dining, but rather increased space for staff — and more room to bake bread. The reconfigured C&B will also have a longer to-go counter for patrons.

Meanwhile, C&B remains open daily for to-go service from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.