Prepping for the Spring Awakening in the neighborhood's community gardens

On April 14, Loisaida United Neighborhood Gardens (LUNGS) is once again hosting a Spring Awakening in honor of the neighborhood's community gardens.

Per the LUNGS website:

This is LUNGS 6th Spring Awakening. It is a neighborhood celebration of the season and the opening of the community gardens. It is all FREE. There will music, a greening theme, kids’ activities, art as well as community-based programs and environmental and educational workshops. Please come and enjoy!

Ahead of that, there's a costume and poster-making workshop this Saturday at the Green Oasis Garden, 368 E. Eighth St. between Avenue C and Avenue D. The activities take place from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Per the flyer: "We've got the supplies, bring your imagination."

A future look at the former 650 E. 6th St.

Beyond the plywood here are the remains of 650 E. Sixth St., the former four-story building just west of Avenue C that workers demolished to make way for a 7-story building that will apparently house condos.



This comes nearly three years after the building's new owners filed plans for the project.

As New York Yimby noted in January 2016: "The 8,491-square-foot project will include 7,761 square feet of residential space, which means units will average 1,552 square feet apiece, indicative of condominiums."

No sign of an official rendering just yet via RSVP Architecture Studio, whose other EV work includes the BP-replacing condoplex on Second Avenue and First Street.

This is this on the plywood...



---


[EVG photo of No. 650 from February 2018]

Noted

Derek Berg shares this Urban Dog Etiquette Sign from Seventh Street: "Stop putting your dog shit on our garbage cans!!!!!"

There's a Rent Laws Town Hall this Saturday

Via the EVG inbox...

New York's rent laws are set to expire this June, giving tenants a unique a chance to push for comprehensive legislation to protect and expand rent stabilization across the state — but we won't win without a fight!

Join the Cooper Square Committee, the Metropolitan Council on Housing and University Settlement, along with a number of local elected officials to learn more about the Housing Justice for All coalition's bold policy platform and to find out how you and your neighbors can get involved in the fight to defend the rights of tenants in New York!

The Town Hall is Saturday (April 6) from 2-4 p.m. at Speyer Hall, 184 Eldridge St. at Rivington Street.

You can read more background on this Gothamist post from March 21 titled "Push For Stronger NY Rent Laws Goes Up Against Powerful Landlord Lobby."

A spirited sendoff for Hattie Hathaway

On Monday night, friends of Hattie Hathaway, aka Brian Butterick, gathered in Tompkins Square Park for a festive sendoff for the gay cultural icon who died on Jan. 30 from lung cancer at age 62.

From the Park, the group — stretching nearly a block long — marched through the East Village to La MaMa’s Ellen Stewart Theater on Fourth Street for a "night of memories, performance, dancing and celebration."

Organizer Chi Chi Valenti, who worked in collaboration with Howl! Happening, Jackie Factory and DJ Johnny Dynell, explained how the evening came together:

"When [Howl! Director] Jane Friedman approached us about helping to stage a big public funeral for this figurative and literal giant, we knew in Hattie's spirit it had to include the East Village community. We organizers were inspired by the Drag March every year from Tompkins Square during Pride weekend, and decided to add such a procession. We did part of the planning from our second home in New Orleans, so naturally the Second Line tradition was also an inspiration as were the LUNGS community garden parades in the East Village that Hattie so loved."

EVG contributor Stacie Joy tagged along with the group, and shared these photos starting in Tompkins Square Park...









Accompanied by a brass band, the group headed out of the Park and onto Avenue A...





The group stopped outside the Pyramid Club on Avenue A, where Hathaway served as creative director...









... and then to LaMama on Fourth Street between Second Avenue and the Bowery...









At LaMama, the full house enjoyed a three-part program with a variety of poems, tributes as well as spoken word and musical performances.



As one participant said, "It was a sendoff fit for a queen."

[Updated] The building housing the former Sidewalk sells on Avenue A

[EVG file photo]

We've heard rumors in the past week that 94-96 Avenue A, the building that housed the Sidewalk Bar & Restaurant for nearly 34 years, had a new owner. (The asking price had been $11.9 million.)

On Monday, the paperwork (dated March 14) for the sale was filed in public records. The documents show that the sale price was $9.6 million. The (so far) mystery buyer is listed as PSC Avenue A LLC. The address on the paperwork corresponds to a law firm (Robinson Brog Leinwand Greene Genovese & Gluck) in Midtown.

Not sure what might be next for the building — or its current tenants. According to the listing, the floor area ratio (FAR) allows for one more floor to be added to the building. And per the listing: "The legendary location has seen many walks of life and now it can be yours. The building is a goldmine in the waiting."

As you likely know, new owners have taken over the former Sidewalk, which closed after service on Feb. 23. So far not many details about what's to come here have been made public. There have been rumors that the new establishment will retain the Sidewalk name... and at least one of the open-mic nights.

Don't look for the new place to be open anything soon. Just last week the city issued a permit for renovation work in the bar-restaurant space.

Updated 4/4

Penn South Capital is the owner, Patch reports. Parag Sawhney, founder of Penn South, had this to say:

"We have a new restaurant tenant that will keep the open mic tradition alive," he said by email. "We love the East Village and believe in preserving what make its so special. We had a very peaceful transition from the previous landlord who also owned and managed Sidewalk. That owner has now retired from business and had no interest in staying on as our tenant."

Previously on EV Grieve:
New owners set to take over the 33-year-old Sidewalk Bar & Restaurant on Avenue A

Sunshine Cinema-replacing office building moving forward; demolition watch back on

[EVG file photo]

An item from Crain's to note... especially if you've been wondering about the status of the Sunshine Cinema's corpse on Houston.

The business journal reported yesterday that demolition will soon commence now that the developers have nabbed some loans.

Developers East End Capital and K Property Group just secured a $67 million construction loan from CapitalSource and $19 million of mezzanine financing from Canyon Partners to fund the roughly $90 million project at 141 E. Houston St.

The builders will now break ground on the planned nine-story, 68,000-square-foot office property, which will seek rents above $100 per square foot. The project, catering to deep-pocketed tenants in search of luxury boutique offices, is expected to be completed in about two years.

In an interview with the Commercial Observer in late March 2018, Gregory Kraut, a managing partner at K Property Group, originally said that the demolition of the former theater that dates to 1898 would begin that spring.

East End Capital and K Property Group, who bought the building for $31.5 million in the spring of 2017, have a website marketing the spaces.

Here's the building's "redefined vision" ...

From acclaimed architect Roger Ferris, the only new development of its type on the Lower East Side, 141 East Houston is a new frame for viewing the neighborhood. Column-free and unbounded by walls, it reinterprets the area through a bold geometric perimeter of cladding and glass. State-of-the-art workspaces and private terraces reframe expectations, while a well-connected location recasts perspectives.

With its glass frame and dynamic courtyard running the length of its eastern side, doubling as a second facade, 141 East Houston challenges the distinction between indoors and out.

The ground-floor space along Houston Street will include outdoor seating in "Houston Alley" ...



The five-screen Landmark Sunshine Theater closed Jan. 21, 2018, after a 17-year run.

As Curbed noted in January 2018: "Rising rents put the theater into financial duress; it was served a death blow in 2012 when the Lower East Side community board rejected Landmark’s proposal to offer food and beverage service at the theater."

Previously on EV Grieve:
Discarded theater seats and goodbyes at the Sunshine Cinema

The 9-story boutique office building coming to the former Sunshine Cinema space

A celebratory ad on the purchase of 139 E. Houston St., current home of the Sunshine Cinema

The boutique office building replacing the Sunshine Cinema will be 'unbounded by walls' with an outdoor space called Houston Alley


[Photo outside the Sunshine on Jan. 22, 2018, by EVG reader Karen]

One Manhattan Square moves to the north

You've certainly seen the towering presence of the 72-floor One Manhattan Square off in the distance from Avenue B... Extell's tower is down at 250 South St. near the Manhattan Bridge.

EVG reader Paul Gale shared this photo yesterday ... part of an Extell mailer that unwittingly shows just how imposing this building is on the LES skyline...



Apparently this is what the intersection of "grit and glamour" looks like — somewhere right at Houston and B.

Report: Irving Plaza closing for 8-month renovation

[That time I saw the Damned last October]

Just as Webster Hall is returning to concert action, another area music venue is closing for renovations.

Irving Plaza on Irving Place and 15th Street will close this summer for an 8-month rehab.

Billboard has the story:

[T]he renovations at Irving Plaza will be overseen by Live Nation clubs and theaters division and include revamps of the lobby area and the music hall, new bars on all levels, the addition of a downstairs VIP lounge and remodeling of the mezzanine including a new box-seating section configuration.

Shows are booked through June 30. Live Nation officials say the venue will reopen in 2020 after eight months of work.

The 1,200-capacity venue has been in use for concerts the past 41 years. The Polish Army Veterans of America have owned the building since 1948.

Here's more history via the Irving Plaza website:

Originally, the building was four separate brownstones, which were eventually combined into a hotel in the 1870s. In 1927, the building was gutted and turned into a ballroom-style theater and christened Irving Plaza.

Over the next few decades Irving Plaza would serve as a union meeting house, a performance space for folk dance troupes, and a Polish Army Veteran community center, as well as a venue for the Peoples Songs Hootenannies with Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie.

In 1978, Irving Plaza was converted into a rock music venue ...

I've always liked the Irving Plaza, though not everyone shares that sentiment.

'Lucky 20' opens today at the Theater for the New City Art Gallery

EVG regular Lola Sáenz is curating a group show titled "Lucky 20" that opens today at the Theater for the New City Art Gallery, 155 First Ave. between Ninth Street and 10th Street.

The exhibit features works — paintings, sculpture, photography and mixed media — by artists who live or have worked in the East Village/Lower East Side.

"Lucky 20" features art from the following: Blanka Amezkua, Marcus Carter, Kathy Creutzburg, Selear Duke, Klay-James Enos, Kris Enos, JT Gray, Blake Greene, James Maher, Alisa Muir, Kanako Nagayama, Rochelle Pashkin, Carolyn Ratcliffe, Irene Rodriguez, Daniel Root, Bonnie Rosenstock and Sáenz.

The opening reception is April 10 from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. And the gallery is open for viewing daily from 10 a.m. to 9:30 p.m.