If the Electric Circus were to open today

At first, this was meant as nothing more than an appreciation of some photos (via Getty Images) of the Electric Circus from 1968 ... with the original photo captions on the first three...

"Patrons at Electric Circus, 23 St. Marks Place, between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, New York City. stops for check. Girls not wearing bras are admitted free on Sundays."

"UNITED STATES - JUNE 27: Transparent plastic bra strap, virtually invisible around back, gives a topless look to formal mini at the Electric Circus at 23 St. Marks Place, New York City. (Photo by William Quinn/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images)"

"Fashionable crowd mill about outside the Electric Circus 23 St. Marks Place, between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, New York City."

Then I started thinking about the reaction if this very same venue would open here today... A hot club promoter (in this case, Jerry Brandt) ... celebrities... crowds from everywhere showing up on St. Mark's Place... how would the community respond? No bra night?! Sounds like some stunt Superdive would have pulled. And look at that mob on the sidewalk! Call 311! (And what would those local bloggers write!) Has the influx of bars and jackasses and woo-wooing in recent years made us intolerant of any nightlife? Or maybe just some nightlife? Or a certain type of nightlife? (I can keep going with the vague rhetorical questions!) Regardless, I would have liked to seen this concept go before today's CB3/SLA committee...

Anyway, here are several more photos from the Getty archives... the Electric Circus closed in 1971... the address now houses a Supercuts and Chipotle ... as well as $17,000 apartments...

By the way, this wasn't meant as a history of the space... plenty has been written about it, including, but not limited to:

Jack Newfield Catches the Electric Circus Opening on St. Marks (The Village Voice)

FRIDAY NIGHT FEVER: The Electric Circus (The Bowery Boys)

Streetscapes / 19-25 St. Marks Place; The Eclectic Life of a Row of East Village Houses (The Times)

Live on St. Mark's Place for only $17,000 per month! (EV Grieve)

Reminders: Record Store Day tomorrow

Support your local record stores tomorrow with, uh, Record Store Day... Still several local record stores left, of course ... Like! Norman's ... Kim's ... Good Records NYC ... Rockit Scientist ... Turntable Lab ... A-1 Records ... Other Music ... Academy Records ... Gimme Gimme ... Hospital Productions... Sounds ...

And not all of the record stores participate in Record Store Day... Check out the site for the full listing... And I have a bad feeling I'm missing an East Village record store or two...

Meanwhile, perhaps Record Store Day has become too commercial? The Daily News discusses that here.

[Updated] A scene from East Sixth Street circa 1979

Shawn Chittle sent along this photo:

Kenny Scharf, John Sex and Keith Haring
East Sixth Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue
June 1979

(The photo came to Shawn via Kenny Scharf)

And thanks to EV Grieve reader Larry Slade for bringing the photo to life ...

And here's one more color-corrected version via Worm Carnevale ...

For anyone worried about the yuppies taking over the Tompkins Square Park ping-pong table

Photographed in the Park yesterday by EV Grieve Ping Pong Correspondent Bobby Williams.

Cooper Union displays its cans

A reader walked by Cooper Union last night on the Seventh Street side and and did a double-take, so to speak... "I just had to go back and see this 20-footer hanging in the atrium."

Thank goodness this isn't hanging in the window on Avenue A and Third Street ...

Bowery beef

A few minutes apart this evening ...

...outside DBGB...

...and Billy's...

$2,500 reward for Harry, who needs his meds

Melanie took this shot and posted at East Village Corner...

And here's another view of a Harry flyer via Bobby Williams...

What the hole in the ground at 250 Bowery will look like

The Post has the story today. The address, south of Houston, will be "a residential building with roughly 84 feet of store frontage. The 24 condo units, a mix of one- and two-bedrooms, will be on floors three through eight, and there will also be a penthouse level. The one-bedrooms will run around 850 to 900 square feet, the two-bedrooms around 1,100 to 1,200 square feet."

BoweryBoogie has been following the story all along. Catch some of his earlier posts on the project.

[H/T Curbed]

You chance to discuss bike lanes tonight

At St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery ... I hope the Post wasn't invited to cover this!

Will 35 Cooper Square get the St. Ann's treatment?

What if developer Arun Bhatia decides to placate members of the community by keeping part of the structure intact? Much like NYU did by incorporating the façade of St. Ann's into the entrance of the 12th Street dorm.

Goggla mentioned this yesterday in the comments about 35 Cooper Square: "I wonder if something similar could happen here where the façade (or some replica of it) gets 'preserved' purely for decoration."

Would this be a victory? Or is it worse to see the daily reminder of what was entombed around a soulless, glassy tower?

Or, better, 35 Cooper Square could remain, and the mystery project is built around the historic structure... similar to how the Cooper Square Hotel went up next door to the home of Hettie Jones...

[Image via Jeremiah's Vanishing NY]

[Top image via]

Also at 35 Cooper Square: A 'failure to comply' notice

We spotted this new "notice of violation and hearing" taped up to the plywood...

Per the notice:

So from this document, it appears that people can still access the building at "lower roof of property" (That's YOU, Cooper Square Hotel!), just like Runnin' Scared noted two months ago.

Plus! That ongoing issue: the roof is exposed to the elements. A hearing on the matter is set for June 1, according to the document. Just six more weeks of spring rain.

Extra Place fit for Wonder Woman

Yesterday, EV Grieve Superheroine Correspondent Bobby Williams caught part of a photo shoot in Extra Place off the Bowery for what a crew member said was a promo for "the new Wonder Woman movie."

Hmm, well, NBC has a pilot in production for the fall... Anyway, who cares! Look, tiny shorts like Lynda Carter wore!

MTA makes nice

Last Friday, we discussed the story of East Village artist (and EV Grieve commenter) VH McKenzie, who received a letter from an unpaid MTA intern asking her to stop selling her oil paintings on discarded MetroCards subway cards. (She has for sale in her Etsy shop.)

The story made the rounds, from WPIX to The Wall Street Journal.

So all this has ended well. First, as she wrote, her 18 paintings sat "barely noticed and certainly unsold for three months. Until the MTA ordered me to stop 'selling them.'"

She sold them all in less than 24 hours after the attention from the intern's letter.

As she writes on her blog ... VH received a nice email from Mark Heavey, Chief of Marketing and Advertising for the MTA, asking that she: 

...simply change the listing on Etsy to read something like “Original hand-painted art on a NY transit fare card,” and refrain from using an image of an original, unpainted MetroCard in the listing, you may continue to do what you are doing.”

Her response?

Done, Mark. Actually, I did that last week and the Intern still indicated that I should make arrangements for a licensing agreement. ... I pointed out to Mr. Heavey that I had turned the somewhat sour lemon of his unpaid intern’s  “cease and desist” letter into a rather sweet, refreshing citrus beverage.

He wrote:

I wish you continued success with your “fare card art” project… the media does love a good David vs. Goliath story ... Continue to make lemonade.

Meanwhile, she is now working on more MetroCard used subway card paintings to fulfill her requests. 

P.S.
Props to Esquared who helped get the story rolling at Nonetheless.

P.S.S.
Our friend Jen Doll also has an update on this at Runnin' Scared...

Changes in store for Casimir on Avenue B?

Casimir, the French bistro on Avenue B near Seventh Street, was on Monday's CB3/SLA agenda for a transfer. Our friends at East Village Eats have learned that owner Guillaume Blestel has sold the restaurant. EV Eats talked with some of the employees this past weekend "and not much is known about the new owner." One piece of info: Turns out that the new owner is also behind Midtown East-based restaurant/lounge comboLéa.

Never heard of it. Per New York magazine:

Small tables house an after-work crowd early in the evening, enjoying better-than-average bar fare from the kitchen, including sushi, bruschetta, and crab cakes. As the night wears on, the darkness deepens and the music—contemporary hip-hop and house beats that don't quite fit the lounge-y décor gets louder.

Anyway, no word yet if the new owner plans to keep things the same or turn the place into another Midtown East outpost... like too many other places already around here.

Personal Affairs closing on Seventh Street

Personal Affairs, the German-based boutique on Seventh Street between Avenue A and First Avenue, is closing after 11 years. Paper & String reports that the closing could come as early as Sunday.

And the tough times continue for vintage clothing stores and boutiques...

Previously on EV Grieve:
East Village vintage stores doomed?

More vintage doom: Beauty Crisis is closing

Other closings:

The song remains the same: Physical Graffiti latest thrift store to shutter

Atomic Passion has closed

Monk Thrift Shop on Avenue B

Atomic Passion on Ninth Street

O Mistress Mine on 11th Street

Andy's Chee-Pees on St. Mark's Place

Fab 208 is moving into a smaller space on Seventh Street


[Image via]

The Bowery Wars take to the streets!

From the EV Grieve inbox...

Downtown Art presents The Bowery Wars, Part 1, original music theater of NYC's turbulent past, performed in the streets, April 30-May 22.

In 1903, Tammany Hall burns to retake city hall, while on the streets of the Lower East Side the battle for control of the Bowery between the Five Pointers and the Eastmans explodes in the worst gunfight New York had ever seen. The Bowery Wars, an epic told in two parts, weaves into these historical events the story of two immigrant teens, Romeo and Juliet.

New York City's history is our shared inheritance. The Bowery Wars looks at our city a hundred years ago, when the Lower East Side was the densest place on earth, and poses questions about the will to survive in the face of hardship and violence.

Hope to see you there!!

Actors: Lily Abedin, Michael Andrew, Zen Anton, Alyssa Burgos, Lauren Burgos, Oscar Hallas, Robby Jenkins, Tatiana Jorio, Jarrett Jung, Jeanne Kessira, Geri Kirilova, India Kotis, Alma Moos Nunez, Alice Quinn Makwaia, Max Molishever, Jasai Chase Owens, Jake Paganakis, Shawn Suggs, and Erin Wells

Musicians: Matthew Burgos, Mike Emmerich, Michael Hickey, Zachary Lewellyn, Eugene Rivera

Go here for tix and location.

Today in Union Square

Photo by Blue Glass. And did you know that someone stole Gandhi's glasses off the statue?

Avenue A, 5 p.m., April 13

Missing East Village teen found safe

Alexander Vorlicky, 14, who disappeared from his parents' East 10th Street home on Sunday, has been found unharmed, the NYPD said. No other details are known at the moment.

There are reports at DNAinfo ... and Runnin' Scared ...

EV Grieve Etc: Mourning Edition

The latest on the 9th Precinct rape trail (NY Post)

The ugly past of Clinton Street murder suspect (Daily News)

The faux-ostrich penthouse of the Christodora (Curbed)

NYC in photos from 1975 (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Crime-and-grime video from the 1970s (Animal NY)

Csquat dance party (Slum Goddess)

MTA using passenger cars to transport trash (Runnin' Scared)

Missing Jeffrey's Meat Market (BoweryBoogie)

Everything you need to know about New York coffee (Eater)

Streit’s not going anywhere on the LES (The Lo-Down)

Katz's unleashes a Rangers-themed sandwich (Grub Street)

And some spring cleaning the other day outside Esperanto on Avenue C and Ninth Street..

[Photo by Bobby Williams]