Stat of the day

Just three applications for new buildings were filed in Manhattan in September, compared to 23 in September 2007 -- a staggering 87 percent plunge, city Department of Buildings data shows. (New York Post)

Demolition on East Fifth Street

Given the small parcels of open space on either side of 532 E. Fifth St., this four-story house was a rarity...which, of course, made it an endandgered species in this era of build-a-condo-on-every-piece-of-open-space development. It has been a four-unit apartment building. (As of last fall, a three-bedroom apartment was going for $3,500.)

Sure enough, the building is now being demolished. Don't know what's going in the space just yet, but the rumor among some locals is, of course, a condo.

Those locksmith guys will even leave a card on a building being demolished.

One of the condo-rumor spreaders frets that such change will usher in even further development (even in this economy) on this little stretch of the East Village.

Ludlow Street's iconic Kleen-Stik Industries becomes a cantina

Between Stanton and Rivington at 139-141 Ludlow, at the site of the Kleen-Stik Industries, Inc.

Oh, sorry...This is just a prop set for filming the TV series Cupid today. But don't give anyone any stupid ideas!




In October, our friend BoweryBoogie reported that the beloved graffiti exterior of the building had been cleaned. Perhaps this is why...for the film shoot?

Court date for 47 E. Third St. tenants/landlord

Showdown in court today over the fate of 47 E. Third St. (New York Post)

The EV Grieve 47 E. Third St. archive.

Something else to threaten the very soul of the East Village: Cupcakes

Yes, indeed! Just a little frosty something for you to enjoy during the economic meltdown! As Eater has noted, Butter Lane Cupcakes will soon call 123 E. Seventh Street home. According to their Web site, "We think of it as cupcakes for grownups."

Previously, the nonprofit Bodanna Studio & Gallery was here. They were dedicated to helping inner-city youth...and before that, the Theo Wolinnin funeral home.





Let's just hope the Cupcakers keep the historic "Licensed Undertaker" sign on the building.



For further reading, all you cupmudgeons:
Cupcake trash (Jeremiah's Vanishing New York)

Stopping work at 123 Third Ave.

This past weekend, I noticed a "stop work order" had been slapped on the new bank/condo tower now under way on the southeast corner of 14th Street and Third Avenue.

Things that I missed: The bank branch switcheroo!

Well, when did this happen? The last week or two? I had read about the TD Bank-Commerce merger last year...Anyway, that sparkly old Commerce Bank on Third Avenue and 10th Street is now a TD Bank.

But will the FD be as nice as the old Commerce? As Forbes noted:

[W]ill it be good for Commerce customers, who have grown used to a decidedly "non-bank" attitude? Time will tell. TD Bank will have to navigate that slippery slope carefully so as not to damage what they just bought. Commerce is prized for its ability to generate deposits (28% growth annually) and simultaneously spend on perks that many other banks have long ago abolished in the interest of cost savings.
Those perks include things like weekend and late night hours, lollipops and free pens, free coin sorting machines for everyone (even non-customers), and wide open branch lobbies that look more like auto showrooms than bank branches.

Well, they are still dog friendly at least.

And they hired the Reg and what's-her-name as spokespeople!

Previously on EV Grieve:
Any more friendly and I would have thought that I was at the DMV

27 years, 1 dumpster

You know it's a recession when...

East Village resident Paige Ferrari, 26, was one of the 35 employees who lost their jobs when Radar abruptly folded a few weeks back. In a piece in the Times today, she talks about the layoffs and the future. Among the obnservations:

You picture the layoffs as “Oh, I worked at the plant for 10 years, and then they didn’t want me to make this certain wheel part anymore.” Not people in this sort of cushy industry — maybe it’s a trickle-up thing? It’s starting to affect the yuppies in the East Village. That’s when you know it’s a recession: when your yuppie neighbors are going on unemployment.

Later:

I came home one day and my roommate was trying to call unemployment. That’s when I still had a job, so I was very smug. He was trying to call unemployment to get his unemployment money, but he couldn’t get through the menu because he had just got a new iPhone. So he was trying to find the keypad on the new iPhone. I was like, “I don’t think the unemployment menu is set up for people with iPhones.

Recapping yesterday's local college football scores

Holy Cross 38, Fordham 17

Monmouth 19, Sacred Heart 7

Richmond 34, Hofstra 14

Harvard 42, Columbia 28

Ice Cream University 31, Fudge State 0

Nightmares

Outside Ace Bar, Election Night. Fifth Street near Avenue B.

Wolves and whacked medics

On the list for the Halloween season were two movies with some fine NYC scenery. There was Wolfen with Albert Finney from 1981. NYPD detective Finney investigates some grizzly murders...and there's some amazing footage of the city, particularly the South Bronx, from that era:





Bringing out the Dead from 1999, fair-to-middling for a Martin Scorsese film, is stylish enough. Nicolas Cage -- before he morphed into the Grade-A buffoon -- is the Manhattan medic losing his mind. And here's nice usage of Janie Jones by the Clash.

Commie controversy at Cooper U!

From the City Room:

After complaints to the city Buildings Department, and concern from the Urkainian community in the East Village, Cooper Union removed a giant banner with a reproduction of a Picasso drawing of Joseph Stalin. That decision has outraged Lene Berg, the 43-year-old Norwegian artist who included the banner as part of her one-woman art installation, “Stalin by Picasso, or Portrait of Woman with Mustache,” in the school’s historic Foundation Building, on East Seventh Street.

“I didn’t get any explanation of what happened,” Ms. Berg, who is based in Berlin, said in a phone interview this week. She said Cooper Union officials removed the banner last Friday, five days after it went up, without consulting either her or Sara Reisman, associate dean of Cooper Union’s School of Art and the curator of the exhibition.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Red Square has Lenin; Cooper Union now has Stalin

Everyone wanted to help make a difference

At 8th Street and Avenue B.

It has begun: The downturn

According to the Times anyway:

EVEN though the average price for a Manhattan apartment, at $1.5 million, is higher than it was a year ago, some New York neighborhoods have already started to feel the downward tug that has wrenched the housing market elsewhere in the nation.

Such as:

Other neighborhoods that experienced price drops include the Lower East Side and the East Village, where median prices fell 5.5 percent...

Autumn in Tompkins Square Park

A little late for this work week...

Movie party tonight

Many thanks to Flavorwire for asking me to write a post on the demise of the Pioneer Theater. The post is here.

Meanwhile, the Pioneer folks are throwing a farewell party tonight at 6 with popcorn, free movies and, we hope, some good schlock.

Giving Extra Place the warm, comfortable feel of suburbia

The Villager has an update on Extra Place:

Neil Cardi was walking down E. First St. between Second Ave. and the Bowery, when he stopped. He was wearing a worn-out rocker T-shirt and black skeleton biker gloves, complete with trench coat slung over his shoulders. Standing by the small, cul de sac in midblock, he sneaked a smirk at the grimy, graffiti-covered walls and scraps of trash that decorated the obscure alley.

“This place gives me comfort,” said Cardi, a former amateur musician who has struggled with substance abuse. “I remember spending a night or two here as the Rolling Stones rolled out the back of that door. It used to be CBGB.”

The unmarked place Cardi stood in front of is a deserted street known as Extra Place and some say that since the 1970s this historic alleyway has given character to the Lower East Side.

Sigh.

AvalonBay’s advertisements that run along the walls between the Bowery and Second Ave. read, “The Redefined Bowery.” And redefining is exactly what residents of 11 E. 1st St. and 22 E. First St., together known as Avalon Bowery Place condominiums, want for Extra Place.

“Clean it up!” and “It’s pretty ugly” were the reactions of people coming out of both buildings as they walked from pressure-washed sidewalks surrounding the new buildings to aged, gum-covered splats of cement. Jennifer, a resident of two months who declined to give her last name, said of the attraction of fixing up Extra Place with cafes: “The less I have to travel for nightlife the better.”

So is Extra Place nothing more than an alley that needs a sprucing up or is it one of the last remnants of old New York? The vote is split.

“It’s kind of famous as the back door of CBGB’s. It’s the backdrop of The Ramones’ ‘Rocket to Russia’ album,” said Fred Harris, senior vice president of AvalonBay, of Extra Place. He said it’s unclear if the parcel is even an officially mapped city street, but, “Regardless of its status, or whether or we own it or not, we just want to clean it up, light it and maintain it and pedestrianize it.”

Extra Place coverage on EV Grieve

David Duchovny really needs to hire better help

From The Villager's police blotter this week:

Police arrested three men shortly before 1 a.m. on Fri., Oct. 24, and charged them with stealing four bottles of oral-sex drops, three bottles of massage oil, a porn movie tape, a package of nipple cream and a sex toy, all from Cherry Box, an erotica shop at 162 W. Fourth St. The suspects, Corey Brown, 31; Malcolm Anderson, 26, and John Francis, 28, were charged with grand larceny after the woman who was tending the shop identified them, police said.

Developing!: A sign appears at 159 Second Ave.

A few weeks ago, we passed along word that the former A. Fontana Shoe Repair at 159 Second Ave. and 10th Street was becoming a vegan ice cream joint. Well, the front windows have been papered over for weeks. And then! A sign just appeared, as this photo from our tipster shows:



Stogo? As in consultant Malcolm Stogo of the Ice Cream University?

Whether this place has anything to do with Stogo, we'll share his bio anyway -- because it's delicious! (heh):

For the last 25 years, Malcolm Stogo has been in the forefront in developing today's ice cream concepts leap years ahead of the industry. He is the author of Ice Cream & Frozen Desserts, co-author of Ice Cream Cakes, and author of a new book titled How To Succeed in the Incredible Ice Cream Business. He is President of Malcolm Stogo Associates, an international ice cream consulting firm, as well as founder of Ice Cream University, a seminar series and publishing company on ice cream production, and marketing and publisher of Batch Freezer News and Ice Cream Store News, two quarterly newsletters on everything one needs to know about ice cream production and marketing. In the 1980's, he co-owned Ice Cream Extravaganza (New York), the largest single frozen dessert operation ($1,500,000 in sales). He also invented the chocolate dipped waffle cone now being produced and sold all over the world.

I can't get past Ice Cream University. ICU? Go Defibrillators! (And do they have a football team?)