Today in discarded timeless classics

EVG reader David shares this photo... showing an Eames Lounge Chair and ottoman (black/rosewood) discarded on the curb outside 217 E. Third St. between Avenue B and Avenue C.

Currently priced at $4,500.75 online.

The latest on the city's rat-curbing initiatives

[Photo from May 9 by EVG reader Annabelle]

The Post checks in on the mayor's latest effort to curb the city's rat population ...

The city has begun stationing an army of workers in 30 parks in Manhattan, Brooklyn and The Bronx to warn people that it “has experienced problems with rats” and make sure they know that “rats are a health hazard, especially to children and seniors,” according to internal Parks Department e-mails and sources.

But some residents say the move only shows that City Hall is a Mickey Mouse operation.

“You know what would be more useful? If de Blasio had them empty the trash more often,” said Rob Wooster, in Tompkins Square Park in the East Village Sunday.

Chelsea Casey, 28, who was at the park with her three kids last week, added, “I don’t know what warning people about rats in New York City will achieve.”

Union members with the Parks Department said workers with both the agency’s Parks Enforcement Patrol and Urban Park Rangers divisions were first dispatched last week. The union said the move is sapping valuable manpower that is meant to police the city’s 30,000 acres of park land.

Last July, the city delivered new solar-powered trash cans to points in and around Tompkins Square Park as part of the mayor's $32-million plan to combat vermin in rat-popular neighborhoods, like this one. (The Daily News reported at the time that each can costs $7,000.)

As the top photo shows, the big bellies aren't really helping with the overflow of trash — at least when they're not emptied, as Rob Wooster told the Post.

The city would not respond to questions from the Post about whether the cans have been effective.


[Avenue A and 10th Street]

Previously on EV Grieve:
8 more solar-powered, rat-proof trash cans arrive in Tompkins Square Park

Looking at the Big Belly 1.0 and 2.0 in and around Tompkins Square Park

City ready to attack rats in Tompkins Square Park (and elsewhere) (again)

Report: Steve Croman's post-jail plans include welcome-home party in the Greek Islands

Richard Johnson at the New York Post reported yesterday that currently incarcerated landlord Steve Croman "will celebrate his freedom next month in the Greek Islands."

An unnamed source told Johnson that Croman's wife Harriet "is planning a big welcome-home party in Greece." Another source said it was a "small family gathering." (The Croman brief by Johnson is not online.)

Last June, Croman pleaded guilty to three felonies for fraudulently refinancing loans and committing tax fraud. He was to serve up to a year in prison and pay a $5 million tax settlement, per the AG's office.

Croman is currently serving his jail sentence at the Manhattan Detention Complex, aka the Tombs, for mortgage fraud. Last October, the AG's office announced that Croman was "transferred to Rikers Island for one year jail sentence." (BoweryBoogie first reported that Croman was in the Manhattan Detention Complex.)

Public records show that Croman (in the system last October as Steven Crowman) is expected to be released on June 3 ...


[Screengrab from October]

Croman's real-estate portfolio via 9300 Realty includes 47 buildings with 617 units in the East Village.

Previously on EV Grieve:
AG's office: Steve Croman agrees to pay $8 million to the tenants he harassed

Yuan Noodle may be yielding to a Mexican restaurant on 2nd Avenue

[Image via the CB3 website]

Applicants from Butter Midtown are looking to open a Mexican restaurant at 157 Second Ave. between Ninth Street and 10th Street.

The team behind the proposed venture, including Executive Chef Michael Jenkins and Beverage Director Eder Canseco, are expected to appear before CB3's SLA committee tonight for a new liquor license. This is described as a sale of assets. The current tenant is Yuan Noodle, which just opened last summer in the space.

The questionnaire on file at the CB3 website (PDF here) provides extensive details about the restaurant:

We believe our concept of American Mexican cuisine will bring a new variety of food to this neighborhood. In an area filled with primarily Japanese, Chinese, Taiwanese, and American restaurants within a two block radius, this will provide a unique option for local residences ...

Along with Michael’s concepts, Eder’s mom Rosa will be bringing in her Mexican taco recipes that offers a more traditional take. Rosa learned how to cook from her mother-in-law who learned from her from mother and grandmother. This dates back to over three generations of classic Mexican cooking. The Breukelen style for some dishes will include small touches to traditional recipes that feels like a home cooked meal is being served. The right balance in sweet and spicy in her mole and Pipian sauce recipes will be unique to the neighborhood.

The unnamed restaurant has proposed hours of 5 p.m. to midnight Sunday through Wednesday; until 2 a.m. Thursday through Saturday.

The address has been home to several high-profile restaurants in recent years. Biang! — the sit-down Chinese restaurant via Xi'an Famous Foods owner Jason Wang — closed in March 2017 after 15 months in business. Wylie Dufresne's bistro Alder, closed after two-and-a-half years at the end of August 2015.

Other recent restaurants here (before 2013) included Plum and Cafe Brama.

Upon its opening last summer, Yuan garnered positive notices. Eater declared that the rice-noodle dishes here were "nothing short of spectacular." The Times was also generous with the praise.

The CB3-SLA meeting is tonight at 6:30. The location: the Public Hotel, 17th Floor, Sophia Room, 215 Chrystie St. between Houston and Stanton.

[Updated] Double Chicken Please vying for former Shoolbred's space on 2nd Avenue

[Photo from July 2017]

This item has now been withdrawn from tonight's agenda.

Restauranteur Huey Cheng is the applicant of record behind a venture called Double Chicken Please for the former Shoolbred's space at 197 Second Ave.

Cheng, who currently operates Raku on Sixth Street and Kura on St. Mark's Place, is on this month's CB3-SLA docket for a new liquor license for the storefront between 12th Street and 13th Street.

According to the questionnaire (PDF here) on file ahead of tonight's meeting, Double Chicken Please will feature a menu specializing in "pan Asian" fare. The restaurant would accommodate 65 diners via 10 tables, plus a bar with 15 stools ... with proposed daily hours of noon to 2 a.m.

Last month, Cheng was the applicant of record for two spaces. CB3 approved his takeover of 304 E. Sixth St. but not 117 Avenue A. (Among other reasons for the denial on the former Black Rose space on A: "there is insufficient public benefit in the approval of a full on-premises liquor license for a business with a mixology concept with food in an area well-served with licensed businesses furnishing food and cocktails and in a location which is now unlicensed."

As for 197 Second Ave., Shoolbred's, the upscale, Scottish-style pub, closed last June after nine-plus years in service.

The CB3-SLA meeting is tonight at 6:30 in the Public Hotel, 17th Floor, Sophia Room, 215 Chrystie St. between Houston and Stanton. Other applicants this month include for 2 St. Mark's Place and 136 Second Ave. You can find the full list of applicants at the CB3 website.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Shoolbred's is signing off on Father's Day

BarBacon signage arrives on 4th Avenue

BarBacon is looking closer to its projected summer opening over at 127 Fourth Ave. between 12th Street and 13th Street... the BarBacon signage is now in place at the bacon-centric bar-restaurant that celebrates the whole hog with swine-spiked menu items and drinks.

This will be BarBacon's second NYC location. (The other is on Ninth Avenue near 55th Street.)

This Fourth Avenue space was previously the bar Royal, which closed in April 2016.

Previously on EV Grieve:
BarBacon looking to pig out now on 4th Avenue

Santatorum has not been open lately on Avenue C

Several residents who live near Santatorum, the hospital-themed cocktail lounge on Avenue C at Second Street, report that the bar has been dark of late. (One reader put the closure timeline at several weeks.)

The website is still active, though the bar's phone is not in service. The doors were also locked during their posted business hours this past weekend.

This creation of mixologist Albert Trummer opened in April 2016. The hospital theme drew media attention with the cocktails prepared on operating-room trays, while shots were served in syringes. (When the bar first opened, entrance was said to be by appointment only.)

We reached out to Trummer via the email address posted on the Santatorum website. Will update when/if we hear back. Trummer most recently brought his theatrical cocktails to the revamped Bar Freud on La Guardia Place.

Week in Grieview

[Caught in the rain on Avenue A via Derek Berg]

Stories posted on EVG this past week included...

Q&A with the authors of the "Rock & Roll Explorer Guide to New York City" (Thursday)

Printed Matter will have a bookstore inside the Swiss Institute's new 2nd Avenue home (Tuesday)

Funny business: Comedy club replacing comedy club on 4th Street (Monday)

The latest I Am a Rent-Stabilized Tenant (Friday)

At Dual Specialty Store (Thursday)

Don't be surprised to see a human take your order (and cash) at the Astor Place Shake Shack (Monday)

Tinkersphere leaves 5th Street for the Lower East Side (Friday)

An injured opossum on Avenue B (Monday)

The former East Village Cheese space has a new tenant on 7th Street (Friday)

Bareburger making its Orchard Street debut (Thursday)

Moxy East Village arrives at the lobby level (Monday)

Pink Bear Ice Cream and Steam Rice Roll has apparently closed on 14th Street (Tuesday)

Cafe Zaiya has closed on Cooper Square (Wednesday)

About the bar-restaurant proposed for 2 St. Mark's Place (Tuesday)

2 years later, 136 2nd Ave. ready for its restaurant (Wednesday)

Hot Box looking ready to debut on 2nd Avenue (Monday)

Report: Ravi DeRossi bringing Fire & Water to 7th Street (Tuesday)

... and something for the birds on St. Mark's Place... photo by EVG reader Hansley Yunez...



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Teenage fan club: Basquiat exhibit opens tonight at Howl! Happening

[Image from 1979 by Robert Carrithers]

"Zeitgeist: The Art Scene of Teenage Basquiat" opens this evening (6-8) at Howl! Happening, 6 E. First St. near the Bowery. Here are details via the EVG inbox...

Howl! Happening: An Arturo Vega Project is pleased to announce "Zeitgeist: The Art Scene of Teenage Basquiat," a group exhibition focusing on the artists and scene around Jean-Michel Basquiat's teen-aged, pre-fame years.

Curated by Howl! Happening, Sara Driver, Carlo McCormick, and Mary-Ann Monforton, "Zeitgeist" complements and amplifies the theatrical release of Sara Driver’s film "Boom for Real: The Late Teenage Years of Jean-Michel Basquiat."

The period covered in the exhibition and film tells the story of Jean-Michel’s early work, peers, and creative community in gritty, pre-AIDS, downtown New York — before the rise of the 80s art and real-estate juggernaut.

Special events will include:

• A panel discussion featuring Alexis Adler, Felice Rosser, Lee Quiñones, Al Diaz, and more
• A screening of Howard Brookner's 1983 documentary "Burroughs: The Movie" from the Criterion Collection
• An evening of films featuring an experimental film by Basquiat’s bandmate Michael Holman, with a soundtrack by Gray, the band he and Basquiat formed; David Schmidlapp’s film of Walter Steding playing beneath the Brooklyn Bridge; and Paul Tschinkel’s film about New York/New Wave, curator Diego Cortez’s groundbreaking exhibition at PS1 in 1981
• A performance by Felice Rosser
• A special series of film screenings in collaboration with Anthology Film Archives

Find more details here. The exhibit is up through June 10.

"Boom for Real" opened back on Friday at the IFC Center.

Neighborhood Open Days start today at the New York City Marble Cemetery

The New York City Marble Cemetery on Second Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue returns with its Neighborhood Open Days through October... the peaceful green space action starts today from noon to 6 p.m. ... [Updated 1 p.m. — they closed for now with the rain. They will reopen if it lets up...]



And it hasn't been so peaceful during the week on the block with the street work...

Mother's Day at Albert's Garden

[Image via Albert's Garden]

Via the EVG inbox...

Albert's Garden is opening for a Mother's Day celebration tomorrow (May 13!) from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Stop by with your mom, family or even yourself to this serene East Village community garden and enjoy refreshments, a view of the goldfish or a relaxing sit under one of our shade trees.

The garden is at 16 E. Second St. between Second Avenue and the Bowery.

Green day

EVG reader Daniel Root shared these photos of the "Ecological City 2018 – Procession for Climate Solutions" in progress on Avenue C and Seventh Street... here's the schedule for the rest of the afternoon.









"Ecological City" is described as "a climate action, ecological urban pilgrimage and performance art event."