Friday, October 30, 2009

By the way...

Please let me know if you see anyone out this weekend wearing the Michelle Obama mask. Like the one here at Duane Reade on Avenue B and Second Street.





Previously on EV Grieve:
Looking at the Michelle Obama Halloween mask at Duane Reade

From the EV Grieve in-box:

Will you be live blogging the NYC marathon Sunday?

Report: No action taken yet on Le Souk (Update: "Two nights ago it finally closed down.")



In his "Mixed Use" column at The Villager, Patrick Hedlund follows up on the news last week that Le Souk is losing its liquor license. Residents who live near the hookah hotspot on Avenue B near Fourth Street shouldn't celebrate just yet.

Susan Stetzer, Board 3's district manager, said that despite the recent action, the club was up and running this past weekend.

"People that live in the area were celebrating the news, and by Sunday night they were complaining to the community board," she said.

The S.L.A. only has the power to confiscate liquor licenses and can't actually close the location. According to Stetzer, police at the East Village's Ninth Precinct had not been contacted about the ruling or asked to take any action.

"I must say, I'm a little frustrated," she added, recalling that after Le Souk's first cancellation, the club continued to operate for eight months. "It is really difficult to get any information on what the S.L.A. is doing about this."


UPDATE! Per the comments:

"I live across the street from Le Souk and couldn't wait for it to close! Two nights ago it finally closed down. No restaurant, no club, no bouncers, traffic, or underage squealers or fighters."

Previously.

Three guesses



New on the plywood on St. Brigid's along Avenue B at Eighth Street.

Noted




The whole city is pretty much a pub crawl this weekend, pub crawls aside. Anyway, if you are interested, here's a list of the 100 or so participating bars, including Bounce Deuce.

Have a ball



If you are looking for something Halloween-related to do this weekend (I still say to stay in and watch "C.H.U.D."), the Times has a long list of activities and what not... including, Theater for the New City's 33rd annual Halloween Costume Ball tomorrow. Costume categories include "Most Roman Polanski," "Most Economically Recovered" and "Most Unchanged Conservative."

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Time already for another CB3 liquor license meeting!

The agenda for the November meeting is now live... taking a quick look...



Hmm...Destination on Avenue A is up for a renewal/with compliant history.... And there are plans for the former Kelley & Ping space on the Bowery at Second. A two-level bar, eh? (and whatever happened to those reports that the heinous East Village Yacht Club was opening here?) And something called Vibrations at 116 Avenue C? That is (was?) the home of Lava Gina.

Pay no mind to those helicopters hovering over the city all day today and tomorrow


Thanks to the EV Grieve reader for pointing out this item from the Post:

Don’t be alarmed if you see low-flying helicopters around Manhattan.

New York City officials say they’re being used for a movie.

They’ll be around the city between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. on Thursday and Friday.

The locations include midtown, Wall Street, and the George Washington, Manhattan and Verrazano bridges.


Previously on EV Grieve:
Updated! Mysterious, low-flying helicopter returns...

Image via.

Your chance to live above Sunny and Annie's while making money and entertaining in the triplex

So while we've been speculating about what addresses on Third Street might be for sale... here's an interesting two-building combo that has been on the market...

According to the Halstead listing for 543 E. Sixth St. at Avenue B:

INCOME PRODUCER WITH OWNER'S TRIPLEX
Two buildings comprising 4 junior one bedroom apartments, two commercial spaces and a luxurious owner's triplex with oversized terrace and roof designed for entertaining. The 4 junior ones are all free market, three are leased and one is currently available for rent. The triplex is also leased free market
.

So...as the owner in the triplex, you'd get to live above Sunny and Annie's...? Sandwich run!




Priced at $4.8 million.

Trick-or-treat at the Economakis mansion

At 47 E. Third St.








Starting to look a little weathered, though, this past week...





Previously.

Is a simple "wash me" too much to ask for?

In my haste to post the first tag spotted at the new Cooper Union academic building the other day, I forgot to note the other artwork that has arrived this fall....

OK, so we can make out that first word, but even up-close, that second word is a mystery ... seems like some variation of yuppies.


School of Rock




Found these up around 15th Street near Third Avenue. I'll teach these punks what it means to shred...

Noted


Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of New York is now blogging. His first post: "God Is Everywhere, Even on the Blog!" (Via The New York Times.)

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Corner restaurants popular for film shoots today (and probably other days...)

We have the low-budget "Hated" at Life on 10th Street and Avenue B...(Assuming that it's not about GG...)



...and HBO's "How to Make it in America" at the ramenators at the former Love Saves the Day location on Seventh Street and Second Avenue.

Continuing to speculate about what 10-room, $15-million home is for sale on East Third Street

Yesterday, we started speculating about what 10-bedroom house on East Third Street might be for sale for nearly $16 million. Mostly because we're curious about what nearly $16 million gets you these days in the neighborhood. Plus, well, there's more to it than that. According to the frustratingly detail-free listing, the deal includes the adjoining building.



Many of us immediately thought of the Economakis dream mansion at 47 E. Third St. The square footage is nearly identical, for one thing. And there has long been speculation that, after successfully evicting the building's tenants, the owners would flip the property immediately to make big money. The Economakis family, for their part, have insisted they'll live there — maybe forever, as they told Scoopy.

Anyway, EV Grieve reader Marjorie pointed out that "the Trulia listing says it's in zip code 10009. That means this mystery place is east of first avenue; the Economakis place is between 1st and 2nd aves — zip code 10003."

However, Chris Flash at The Shadow has been closely following the story. He wrote, "We've been keeping tabs on the real estate marketeers on the LES for decades now (they still send us their 'set-up sheets') and know from experience that they often get little details like zip codes and other info wrong." He states, "We're pretty sure that the Ardor listing is for the Economakis mansion at 47 East Third that they successfully vacated as of August 31."

Meanwhile, EV Grieve reader WB figured these fine homes just east of Third Street were likely candidates...



Good guess, but the listing is with Ardor, and the apartments here are exclusively with CitiHabitats.

Which reminds me I had these photos from the summer...



I liked the sign: "Too many upgrades to mention."



In an e-mail, an EV Grieve reader said that he/she took another look at the Ardor listing, and noticed that you could "map" the address. So they did.



As the readers says, if the map is to be believed, the property lies between Avenue C and Avenue D on the north side of the street...which led them to this possibility...



And the building on the left only has one buzzer, according to the reader, who knows this for some reason...

[Ominously] To be continued....

What you need to know about attending an open house at the Copper Building

In case you were going to check out an open house at the Copper Building on Avenue B at 13th Street...see if that $3.8 million penthouse is suitable... Here's the deal...



You go inside the plywood door and wait by the table. As the sign says, someone will then be down in approximately 15 minutes for the tour. You may want to push back your brunch reservations.

Previously.

"These transparent living spaces, once the quintessence of twenty first century Modernism, have become eyesores"



Steven Hellera, co-founder of the MFA in design criticism program at the School of Visual Arts, wrote an essay for The New Design Observer on the city's floor-to-ceiling window fad.

People in glass apartments shouldn’t throw stones or other projectiles. Nor should they engage in private acts directly in front of their floor to ceiling windows. Yet lately there has been a rash of exhibitionism throughout New York City owing to an increase in floor to ceiling windowed buildings. Influenced in part by Richard Meier’s glass box towers in lower Manhattan (and his newest one at One Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn), these transparent living spaces, once the quintessence of twenty first century Modernism, have become eyesores, particularly at night when they take on the appearance of showrooms in Amsterdam’s red light district.


And!

Why would anyone want their intimate life exposed to any peeping Tom, Dick or Harry? In other words, what were the architects thinking? And why are so many developers buying into this aesthetic?




For further reading:
Naked City (Jeremiah's Vanishing New York)

Bottom photo (so to speak!) via the New York Post

Taking another look at the "East Village is dead" mural



A few additions...




Previously.

Noted

From the AntiKris:

Reasons why the once cool east village now sucks: stupid out of town whores who can’t handle their booze now puke all over the streets.


What will it be next time?

Just pointing out that the catchphrase to Yahoo!'s annoying new $100 million marketing campaign...



is the same as the tagline for the classic "Jaws: the Revenge."