Diaper Genies safe out on the streets

For now, anyway! Jill at Blah Blog Blah has the story.

Appreciating the work of James Jowers

Stupefaction has an excellent post on the work of photographer James Jowers. In the mid-1960s, Jowers lived on the Lower East Side and worked a night job at St. Luke's Hospital. This allowed him to roam the city streets during the day taking photos. Here is the Jowers Flickr page with some 50 photos, like the one above of Tompkins Square Park circa 1967.

"So much bad stuff was being built"

Is it Wednesday already? I'm still catching up on reading from last week, such as this terrific Q-and-A with renowned architectural critic Ada Louise Huxtable in the Sunday Times. The 87-year-old has a new book coming out called "On Architecture: Collected Reflections on a Century of Change." She's interviewed in the Times by Phillip Lopate. Here's a smidgen of the Q-and-A:

Lopate: From my perspective, there’s been a healthy shift from seeing cities as basically dying to essentially buoyant, yet still requiring help.

Huxtable: We’ve seen a reversal. Years ago there was white flight to the suburbs, the inner cities were crime-ridden, there was a lot of poverty. We still have poverty, but people started moving back to the cities.

Lopate: There’s also been a shift in attitude regarding density.

Huxtable: Yes, urban renewal tried to get rid of density. It was viewed as concentrating poverty and disease. Now there’s the awareness that density is more energy-efficient and less destructive of the environment than urban sprawl.

Lopate: I take it you’re for density but not for overbuilding.

Huxtable: How can I be against density? I’m a New Yorker! I grew up with density. Still, in a way I’m glad for this downturn in the economy. Because so much bad stuff was being built. This will give us a chance to think, to take stock. I am so weary of these stupid alliances between developers and cultural institutions in which the cultural institution is given a block of space and the developers overbuild the rest and make an enormous profit.
The Museum of Modern Art has become a real estate operation. I admit a certain amount of nostalgia: I remember a street that was once one of the best streets in New York, 53rd Street. Watching it change over the years, I can’t help but view their new Nouvel tower as the last destructive nail.

[Image via pantufla on Flickr]

A quick check on Nassau Street

Back in June, I did a post about walking around Nassau Street in the Financial District. At the time, I wondered how many of the mom-and-pop businesses could stay open with the condofication of the area under way. So far, just on the stretch of Nassau between John Street and Ann Street, four businesses are either closing (like the one above) or have already shuttered. (And then there's Burritoville, which had a location here.) Sure, one thing may not have anything to do with the other, but...

The secret to my FroYoSuccess

Last month, Jeremiah bravely posted a report from the field in the midst of the city's harrowing FroYo Wars, reporting on the changes afoot for dessert pioneer Tasti-D-Lite.

Anyway, for no good reason, I recently came across an ad in Entrepreneur.com highlighting the benefits of starting a Tasti D-Lite franchise:

"Tasti D-Lite is the 'guilt-free' daily indulgence of loyal celebrities, A-listers, supermodels, and any New Yorker in the know."

Abfroyolutely!

So, based on that, you could introduce this deliciousness to, say, the good people of Lima, Ohio:

"You could be the first to bring this New York phenomenon to your area, and start a healthy eating trend in your own community. We're now offering single franchises and multi-unit franchises in many U.S. states and territories. If you seek to grow beyond a single location, our simple business model scales beautifully."

How to get that "East Village look" without some of the unpleasantries

East Village Podcasts came across a style maven who tells you how to do it. (All you need is $279 for the coat!)

Champagne wishes

At First Avenue and 82nd Street.

LES liquor license update

Thanks to Rob at Save the Lower East Side! for his continued coverage of the CB3. He has the results from last night's Liquor Licensing committee at his site. A mini overview:

There was community opposition to 8 applications.
The committee unconditionally denied 4 of these.
Under pressure from the committee, another 2 withdrew,
and the committee approved 2 (both transfers of existing licenses to new owners).
The 2 that were approved had only one resident speaking in opposition.

Meanwhile, Eater has the story of Perbacco's desire to move from its current East Fourth Street spot to bigger digs around the cover on Avenue B. And we can thank Frank Bruni for this!

One way of looking at it, I suppose

Great post on Runnin' Scared at the Voice about those million-dollar condos coming to First Street and First Avenue.

As Tony Ortega writes:

"[T]his morning, we received a cheerful note from developer Bruce Kaplan about his new condo building at First Street and First Avenue. He wondered if a Voice feature might be in the offing, seeing as how Kramer, in an episode of Seinfeld, once referred to "First and First" as the "nexus of the universe."

Yeah, that's clever, and a nice selling point, no doubt. But with Kaplan's one-bedroom condos going for about a million bucks each, we shot back a response: what sort of a feature was he looking for, with his building only adding to the difficulty the non-filthy-rich are having staying in the city?

Here is how Kaplan responded:

Perhaps you might take a longer view.
From http://www.gvshp.org/history.htm, and as you probably know:

"between 1825 and 1840...shrewd speculators subdivided farms, leveled hills, rerouted Minetta Brook, and undertook landfill projects. Blocks of neat rowhouses built in the prevailing Federal style soon accommodated middle-class merchants and tradesmen. From 1820 a more affluent residential development emerged to the east near Broadway."

So without the actions of those shrewd speculators, there would not have been the canvas to paint on what would become the Village. Presumably the Minetta Brook Voice mourned that transformation.

As one of the Village's more famous residents wrote:

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.

If one looks back over time, there are several theorists (Ricardo, Mills, Alonso's Urban Land Theory) whose theories are that rising prices increases, not decreases supply. See also, http://www.chpcny.org/default.html

In any event, for what it's worth, what this shrewd speculator hopes to do with his million bucks is create affordable rental housing in the outer boroughs and preserve that diversity you value.

And Economakis gets the whole building for his dream mansion

The New York Post reports:

Eight holdout tenants who fought for five years to keep their millionaire landlord from turning their Lower East Side tenement into a mansion for himself agreed to be bought out yesterday.

The last rent-stabilized tenants of 47 E. Third St. said they gave in because they weren't confident they would beat real-estate baron Alistair Economakis in the Manhattan Supreme Court trial scheduled to begin yesterday.

Economakis, the son of a Greek shipping magnate, bought the six-story building for $900,000 in 2003 and said he needed it as a home for himself, his wife and two children.

He reached deals with seven of the 15 tenants but the others fought until yesterday.

The tenants will each receive $75,000 under the settlement, except for one elderly resident, who will get $175,000.

Here is the Web site for Alistair Economakis -- The Other Side of the Story: 47 East 3rd Street

Previously on EV Grieve.

Just desserts for Seventh Street?

Yesterday, I mentioned that Butter Lane Cupcakes will be opening soon at 123 E. Seventh St. between Avenue A and First Avenue. Last night, I noticed the previously vacated (and seemingly short-lived) Italian cafe Affettati at 131 E. Seventh St. ...

...will be home to the forthcoming East Village Pie Lounge.




The sign on the door promises everything from Apple to Pecan to Banana Cream Coconut pie -- for $5.25 a slice. Now this stretch of Seventh Street already counts the Chocolate Bar at 127 as a tenant (since June).

[Deathly silence]

So that's the Chocolate Bar. And Pie Lounge. Can we expect, say, the Tapioca Tavern in the vacant store front at 125 E. Seventh St.?

An oral history of the Lower East Side

Filmmaker/video editor Paul Dougherty shoots John J. McCroary's recollections of growing up on the Lower East Side while looking at the book "Life on the Lower East Side: Photographs by Rebecca Lepkoff, 1937-1950." Dougherty, a native New Yorker and East Village resident, tells us more about McCroary on his YouTube post.



I have posted other video works from Paul here.