Report: 90-year-old Blatt Billiards leaving Broadway

Blatt Billiards, a pool table manufacturer, is leaving its longtime home at 809 Broadway near East 12th Street. As The Real Deal first reported yesterday, the building is changing hands for $24 million. The deal includes an additional 7,045 square feet of air rights.

Blatt was a longtime tenant here before buying the building in 1972. The manufacturing portion of the building will move to New Jersey while Blatt looks for a showroom in Hell's Kitchen, per The Real Deal.

The closing is expecting to happen early next year. The new owner is only ID'd as 809 Broadway Associates.

As The Real Deal noted, the building is "one of the last relics of the area’s manufacturing past."

There's now a 7-Eleven conveniently located next door.

Remembering the Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge

On Monday, Gothamist had a post on the new Brooklyn Roasting Company that opened at the former home of the Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge ... at Flushing and Washington Avenues opposite an entrance to the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

We had been to the place, which was built in 1907, a few times... and, despite being way out of bounds in terms of typical EVG coverage, we decided to write about it in November 2010 upon hearing that the bar closed.

An excerpt.

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[A]t first glance inside the Navy Yard, the place seems like your average rundown neighborhood bar. A few regulars are milling about, playing pool. The bartender is cordial. (I'm sort of blending the different trips into one post here....it was always the same.) WBLS is on a little too loudly on the radio. The TV is also on seemingly just as loud — one of those CBS shows that I've never watched on Thursday nights. (CSINCS?)

Eventually around 10 p.m., a lot more women are suddenly in the bar... they walk in, talk with the bartender, spend a lot of time in the women's room. Soon, there are anywhere from five to 10 women va-va-va-vooming around in lingerie, bikinis, etc. Oh! They're all very outgoing, especially when there are just two of you in the bar.

Every few minutes Delicious or Cinnamon or Diamond walks up and asks again if you'd like a dance. No thanks! Two minutes later... There's not much of a chance of sitting here for, say, a few hours drinking without purchasing a $10 dance. (And they don't have change for a $20, oddly enough.) So just sit there in your stool at the bar for the lapdance and wonder why Laurence Fishburne decided to do CSINCS.

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Oh, and here how the place is looking today...


[Photo via Gothamist]

Previously on EV Grieve:
At the Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge (aka, RIP)

No pool, no ping pong

Oh, and no movie.

Tompkins Square Park this afternoon via Bobby Williams.

'Rocky Horror Picture Show' cancelled tonight, and Brad is still an asshole

From the Films in Tompkins Facebook page:

UPDATE: Unfortunately, tonight's screening of THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW has been canceled due to bad weather.

Back next Thursday for another rainout!

This marks the fifth film this summer to be KO'd by the rain or threat of rain.

A new front gate for Tompkins Square Park

Back in the early-morning hours of June 27, a man driving a station wagon crashed through the front gate of Tompkins Square Park on Avenue A and St. Mark's Place. (We never did hear more about this incident.)

Anyway, say goodbye to the various strips of tape and barriers that have been here in recent weeks ... EVG contributor Derek Berg notes that more permanent gate work is in progress this morning...

The incredible plan to build 'Space Invader-esque residential towers' by the Williamsburg Bridge

A reader shares a link to a Wired article titled "Maps of Unrealized City Plans Reveal What Might Have Been."

The piece looks at city plans that (thankfully, in some cases) never came to be... all via Andrew Lynch's Tumblr called Hyperreal Cartography & The Unrealized City ... it's loaded with city maps "collected from libraries, municipal archives, and dark corners of the Internet."

Of some local interest... the above plans from the 1950s-1960s ... it was an idea hatched after Robert Moses didn't get his Lower Manhattan Expressway off the ground...

"[T]he Ford Foundation asked architect Paul Rudolph to envision an urban expressway that was better integrated into the city. Rudolph drew a futuristic city with soaring, Space Invader-esque residential towers around the Manhattan and Williamsburg Bridges. The highway would wind beneath a linear city, and modular housing units would be connected by a pod-like monorail system."

Apparently these plans weren't entirely serious, but entertaining nonetheless.

Sort of like the renderings for the Domino Sugar Factory.


[Via Curbed]

Renovations start at future home of Mee Noodle Shop on First Avenue

As you may know, Mee Noodle Shop is returning to the East Village after a seven-year absence ... just a few storefronts away from its former home on First Avenue at East 13th Street.

Anyway, EVG regular dwg notes that renovations have finally started on the space, previously occupied until March by Birdbath Neighborhood Green Bakery.

In June, Mee's Joyce Chi told The Villager that the restaurant will be reopening in about five months. So if you want to do the math...

Previously on EV Grieve:
Starbucks confirmed for 219 First Ave., former home to Allen Ginsberg's favorite Chinese restaurant

Mee Noodle Shop returning to First Avenue (28 comments)

The Art and Music of Peter Missing on Avenue A

An exhibit featuring Peter Missing's work starts tonight at the Art on A Gallery at 24 Avenue A near East Second Street... up through Sept. 26.

There's a post opening-reception event at 2A at 9, with projections of The Missing Foundation on the wall across the street... The Facebook Event page is here.

Lantern Thai Kitchen closes on Avenue A; Bangkok-based Somtum Der coming soon

Lantern Thai Kitchen has closed at 85 Avenue A... and a sign for its replacement is up (you could actually read it if this photo wasn't blurry). The Bangkok-based Somtum Der will be opening here soon...



The eatery is the first in the United States for Thanaruek Laoraowirodge, who is growing a mini-empire of restaurants in Bangkok.

Here's a quote from him in BK (Bangkok) magazine:

"People in New York already have a good perception of Thai food. They are not just familiar with tom yam, but regional dishes too."

Here's a 3-star (out of 5) review of Somtum Der via BK:

Together with Chef Kornthanut Thongnum, Khon Kaen-native Thanaruek Laoraowirodge has brought his Isaan roots to the capital in the shape of this somtam-focused restaurant whose objective is to steer our taste buds back towards Northern Isaan, and away from the sweeter flavors that Bangkokians so cherish.

And!

Of the score of somtam varieties available, standouts include the tam sua Sakon Nakhon (B65), which comes with freshwater crab and kratin beans, and the tam pla tu khao man (B85), which comes with mackerel and is served with a comforting side of rice cooked in coconut milk. In very different ways, they’re both exemplary of what Thai food does best: balancing a range of flavors and textures. Of course, there’s also a long list of usual suspects, from laabs to tom saep, all equally well executed. We’re less impressed with the deep-fried or grilled meats.

Lantern Thai Kitchen opened in January 2012, replacing Cafetasia, which sported the 100-ounce beer tube.

The Lantern remains open on Second Avenue at 18th Street.

Avenue A 7-Eleven expected to be completed by yesterday

The gut renovation of the space that previously housed Bar on A and Angels & Kings has entered the 11th month... workers are fitting the address here on Avenue A and East 11th Street for a 7-Eleven, of course...

A quick check yesterday shows that the work is expected to be completed by July 31, 2013, aka yesterday.



At this rate, the crew will have the place ready by July 31, 2014.

However, this photo that Bobby Williams took on Tuesday shows some slight progress...



The 7-Eleven franchise website still shows that the store will be ready for Go-Go Taquitos® action in October. This location is still without an owner.

Previously.

Of rats and parties

You may have seen Gawker's "Vermin-Party Index" from yesterday afternoon... in which they examined more than 260,000 311 complaints classified as "vermin" or "loud party/music" from January 2010 to July 2013.

How did this area fare? Pretty good! (Well, good as in bad.)

No surprises here...

Top Party Complaint Neighborhoods:
Interior Williamsburg (11211): 3,544 complaints
East Village (10009): 3,106
Lower East Side (10002): 2,985

Overall though, when you combine the number of vermin and party complaints, we just cracked the top 20 in the five boroughs. The 10009 zip was 20th with 3,761 total complaints about rats and parties... and 10003 was 29th with 3,120 complaints.

Tops? The 11226 zip (Flatbush) with 7,574 complaints, of which 5,847 were rat related.

Head over to Gawker for all the charts and what not.

H/T RyanAvenueA

EV Grieve Eatery Etc.: A theater sign for Archie & Sons; Everyman Espresso returns

And here's the sign for Archie & Sons... a 1950s-style luncheonette opening very soon at 23 Third Ave. The original Archie's operated on Long Island for nearly two decades...

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And a new sign for the incoming Han Dynasty on Third Avenue near East 12th Street...

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[Photo via Facebook by John C. Hume]

Everyman Espresson on East 13th Street closed for a "face lift" back in late June... it reopened yesterday ... in the lobby of the Classic Stage Company.

The sun also rises at 3 a.m.

Andrew Adam Newman on Ave C points us to tonight's forecast at The Weather Channel... where something extraordinary will happen ... as he noted on Facebook, "If you're still up at 3 a.m. ... be sure to look up at the sun poking through the clouds."

Noted

East Houston and Elizabeth.