MulchFest 2016 is getting underway (or it's over, depending when you're reading this)... today and tomorrow (Sunday!) from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. in Tompkins Square Park.
We stopped by early, around 8 this morning, to get a good seat.
Unfortunately, the seats were just arriving.
So me and my +1 went to another MulchFest, but they were "closed for a private event."
Updated 1/10
If you missed the mulching action... here's a clip via EVG regular Greg Masters...
Be sure to watch the awesome tree toss at the 29-second mark...
Crews are out this morning along Avenue A to film scenes for the Hulu supernatural comedy "Deadbeat."
One of the guys setting up the craft services had his young son (age 10? 12?) with him. The boy had a Razor scooter, and was ready to head off on Avenue A and East 10th Street.
The father stops the boy, and says in a firm tone: "This is a nice neighborhood, but that is not a nice Park" — nodding toward Tompkins Square Park. "Do not talk to anyone. Absolutely do not give your scooter to anyone."
Dinner with Christo in Tompkins Square Park (Gog in NYC)
A wide-ranging interview with R.B. Korbet, of the late, great proto-hardcore band Even Worse (Flaming Pablum)
... and a music break with Even Worse live at the Peppermint Lounge circa 1982...
NYPL adds more vintage pics to its digital collection (Curbed)
Interview with Meryl Meisler, who has a new book of photos titled "Purgatory & Paradise: Sassy '70s Suburbia and The City." (Jeremiah's Vanishing New York)
Onetime home of Britney Spears at 14 E. Fourth St. (aka the Silk Building) is on the market for $7.6 million (Curbed)
When the Beastie Boys covered the Beatles' 1965 track "I'm Down" (Dangerous Minds)
As we've been reporting since August, a new bar-restaurant called Avenida Cantina is in the works for 25 Avenue B between East Second Street and East Third Street. Notes posted on the front window announce that the bar will officially open tomorrow (Saturday!).
Here's more about Avenida Cantina based on information on their website:
Three Texans and a New Yorker meet in a bar...
For years, southern transplants in New York have proclaimed the need for REAL Tex-Mex in NYC. Tex-Mex, as southerners know it, does not consist of tiny tacos in corn tortillas or $15 guacamole.
You cried out. We listened. This is not another fancy, overpriced Mexican restaurant. This is your friendly, neighborhood home-cooking, tequila and beer, East Village-charming Tex-Mex experience you crave.
Welcome home.
Here's a look at the menu...
[Click to go big]
Avenida is open from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. seven days a week. The bar is open until 4 a.m. on Friday and Saturday.
In addition to Avenida, there's a speakeasy in the basement space called The Mockingbird. Per the website:
No sign in the sky will tell you where The Mockingbird is nested. Just look for the silhouette on the door in the underbelly of New York’s indelible East Village.
Through that door lays an eclectic bar and lounge serving up tequila-centric cocktails with the gritty swank of a classic Manhattan speakeasy. Built by the hands of local artists, The Mockingbird provides a cozy, yet untamed atmosphere suited for every occasion, from first dates to birthday parties to private events.
That basement space was once Save the Robots... and much more recently Idle Hands.
No. 25 has been several bars in the past few years... It was home for two months to Matty's, which shut down last February ... and, earlier, Idle Hands, Station B and Billy Hurricane's.
A few CB3 watchers have emailed us in recent weeks asking how/why this item was never heard before the Board's SLA committee. Despite the new concept and 100 percent turnover in corporate partners, this item was not heard at the committee this past September.
According to published reports, St. Mark's Bookshop is in danger of losing its home since July 2014 on East Third Street. The storefront in the First Houses between Avenue A and First Avenue is owned by the NYCHA, who reportedly started the eviction process this past July.
Per DNAinfo: "NYCHA ... said the shop owes $68,361.70 as of this month — a combination of its monthly $6,180 rent, as well as an additional $68.94 in monthly water charges."
Bookshop co-owner Bob Contant told DNAinfo that his attorney was working to get the notice dismissed because "there were a lot of problems with the way the notice was served." While Contant said that the Bookshop was behind on rent, the amount that he and his business partner Terry McCoy owe is less than what the NYCHA is claiming. ("The city has one figure, we have another. We're not on the same page.")
There is more information about the eviction at Bedford + Bowery, who first reported on this. And read the full DNAinfo story here, which includes a statement from the NYCHA.
According to an article in May 2014 at The New York Times, the Bookshop's rent is $6,000 at the East Third Street location, roughly one-quarter of the $23,500 charged by their landlord on Third Avenue, the Cooper Union.
The owners return to court on Jan. 20, though they must pay $6,180 to the NYCHA before the case resumes.
On Nov. 30, the Bookshop launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise $150,000 that it needs to stay in business. As of last night, the campaign had brought in $18,756.
The Bookshop is now in its 39th year, spread over several East Village locations.
MulchFest 2016, TWO action-packed holy days of obligation in the blogosphere, is happening tomorrow (Saturday!) and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. in Tompkins Square Park.
Per the Park Depo on what to do: Please remember to remove all lights, ornaments and netting before bringing the tree to the Park. Bags will be provided if you wish to take some free mulch home or, as we like to do, place between our cheek and gum like Skoal.
Also, this is important: Please remember to remove all children from the trees as well.
As you can see, several trees were discarded yesterday in Tompkins Square Park with the children intact, as these photos by EV MulchFest Associate Editor Steven show...
Oh, we're joking. The kids actually took cover here from some Post reporters.
Also, if you can't make MulchFest (lazy!), then the NYC Department of Sanitation is continuing special curbside collections for mulching and recycling of Christmas/holiday trees through next Friday.
The Domino's Pizza® opened its doors on Wednesday here on East 14th Street ... just a little west of Avenue A...
Aside from pizza, the location also offers items ranging from Stuffed Cheesy Breads and Oven Baked Sandwiches to desserts, such as Domino's Marbled Cookie Brownie®.
As our friend Alex at Flaming Pablum first noted yesterday, the longtime Gothic Cabinet Craft shop has quietly closed on Third Avenue at East 13th Street.
The family-owned custom wood furniture shop has some 30 outlets in the NYC metropolitan area, with its manufacturing plant in Maspeth. The East Village location was its first though, when Theodore Zaharopoulos set up shop on the corner in 1969. (In 2014, the company rebranded as Gothic Furniture, which implies something else. But!)
Anyway, as Alex noted, the storefront can be seen multiple times during "Taxi Driver" from 1976 ... (some trivia that Gothic has also noted in its news releases) ... the sign is just to the left of Iris' hat...
An EVG reader pointed out the arrival of "we are closing" signs at Gallery Vercon, the boutique at 332 E. Ninth St. between First Avenue and Second Avenue.
Vashti de Verteuil opened her shop here in 1987... where she carries her own line of jewelry ... and also carries handmade accessories — from hats, scarves and belts — by other designers. The reader who shared this news notes that de Verteuil also teaches at Parsons...
Updated 5:07 p.m.
De Verteuil told Bedford & Bowery that landlord and aspiring lawyerRaphael Toledano was buying 332 E. Ninth St. She was on a month-to-month lease with the previous landlord, but never even had a chance to negotiate a new lease with Toledano's's Brookhill Properties. "The good old days are gone," De Verteuil said. "You know, when the new landlords take over, you can barely afford the rent anyway. Whatever offer they were going to make me, I wasn't going to be able to afford it." The shop's last day is Jan. 15.
Word is spreading that The Sock Man is closing on St. Mark's Place.
A tipster tells us that the last day here is Jan. 18. Friday, Jan. 15 is now the last day.
The shop has been peddling socks, tights, lingerie and other accessories on the block between Second Avenue and Third Avenue since 1983.
We'll share more details as they becomes available.
Updated 1/8
Jeremiah Moss has more on the closing at Vanishing New York.
Per a JVNY reader: Owner Marty Rosen is "being forced off St. Mark's Place forever due to Real Estate tyrannical fascism. It breaks my heart to help him pack up the store. He plans to look for a new space and to continue his online business, but this is so disturbing."
A troubling sign over at Nonna's, the pizzeria at 201 Avenue A between East 12th Street and East 13th Street... a note on the door says that the shop is closed until further notice... and the inside looks pretty disheveled...
Nonna's just arrived this past June, as we first reported. As a reader told us, the pizzeria is/was run by a grandson and his grandmother … the family patriarch operated pizzerias in Long Island and Westchester dating to the 1980s.
EVG readers gave the pizza here high marks. Hopefully this is just some kind of short-term renovation or something.
The space has been pizza the past few years: Fat Sal's, which closed in May 2014, took over in May 2011 from APizzA.
Avenue A is now down two pizzerias... Nino's remains closed at St. Mark's Place, with no sign of life inside of late. So you still have Two Boots at East Third Street and Muzzarella Pizza between East 13th Street and East 14th Street. Not to mention the discount slices at the new 99¢ Pizza at East Sixth Street ... and Mamani Pizza between East Ninth Street and East 10th Street.
H/T dwg
Updated 10:17 a.m.
Looks like Nonna's is closed for good, via Gojira in the comments.
