Week in Grieview

[East Seventh Street. Photo by Derek Berg]

New 6-story building in the works for East Third Street (Tuesday)

Jared Kushner is buying everything (Wednesday)

A new tenant for the Village Scandal space on East Seventh Street (Wednesday)

There is now a 3-story swingers club on the Bowery (Thursday)

Fly talks UnReal Estate (Thursday)

A rent hike for East Village Shoe on St. Mark's Place (Friday)

Jerry's Newsstand has at least another year on Astor Place (Thursday)

At the Pyramid with Jacquelyn Gallo (Wednesday)

East Second Street penthouse with a private pool and lawn (Tuesday)

Plans for market-restaurant at 125 First Ave. on hold for now (Wednesday)

Croxley Ales extension now open (Tuesday)

Renovations ready for P.S. 122 (Thursday)

Wow, this will be built on Norfolk at Delancey (Monday)

Rats now using forks in Tompkins Square Park (Monday)

Tweet smell of unhappiness in the East Village (Friday)

Alphabet Plaza rising on East Houston and Avenue D (Tuesday)

Look at the Rat Castle now! (Wednesday)

Memory of terrible movie continues to haunt the Bowery

Tonight, as Hollywood honors the alleged best movies of 2012... a moment to note that the billboard for "Playing for Keeps" is still up on the Bowery at East Fourth Street. The movie opened Dec. 7. By now, it's likely playing on TNT. Despite an outpouring of 311 calls from distracted residents and motorists who complain of Gerard Butler's hair and what appear to be smiles from a denture commercial, the ad remains...



There's a 4 percent approval rating from critics at Rotten Tomatoes, who describe it this way: "Witless, unfocused, and arguably misogynistic, Playing for Keeps is a dispiriting, lowest-common-denominator Hollywood rom-com."

Saturday

Is it March yet? Photo by James and Karla Murray via Facebook.

Religious zealots target Zoltar again

As you can see, someone has slapped a sticker across Zoltar's name here outside Gem Spa... AGAIN. (See here.)



"Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on everyones [sic] soul."

Unfortunately in America today, fortune teller machines do not enjoy the same freedoms as everyone else, and find themselves at the mercy of religious extremists. Or, at the very least, the target of people brandishing "Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on everyones [sic] soul" stickers.

Noted

At the M14 stop on Avenue A near East 11th Street. More from the Silent Pro 7-Eleven Collective?

Previously on EV Grieve:
Silent Pro 7-Eleven collective launches shock-and-awe counter-offensive

330 Bowery wrapped and ready

Seeing as I already did two posts about the construction of the scaffolding here on the Bowery at Bond... might as well finish the job. It took workers a week, but they have the historic cast-iron building here wrapped and ready for exterior repairs...

Beware the cone-eating sewer grate of Avenue B

At East Ninth Street at the entrance to Tompkins Square Park. Photo by Bobby Williams.

Flight

Somewhere near East 10h Street today. Photo by Bobby Williams.

He's a Magic man

Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band with "I'm Gonna Booglarize You Baby" circa 1972.

FREE HOT DOGS AT JAPADOG

Right now on St. Mark's Place... photo via EVG Facebook friend Bonnie DeWitt...

A one-year customer appreciation day...



Thanks to EVG Facebook friend Robert Mazze for the above photo...

Lyric Diner Coffee Shop neon survives renovation on Third Avenue

Back in August, we noted that the Lyric Diner on Third Avenue at 22nd Street had closed for renovations... Our friends at the pcvstBEE blog report that the owners reopened the space this week... it's now a Greek restaurant called Taverna.

Some good news. Despite the major renovations, the owners are keeping the cool Lyric Diner Coffee Shop neon on the East 22nd Street side, as this photo from @ThingsWendySees shows...



As for their food, you can check out their new menu here.

Study: Tweets show there are 'pockets of unhappiness in the East Village'

Per the Post:

Researchers from the University of Vermont mapped out the city’s happiest areas using a complex formula that can pinpoint tweet locations and rate their relative “happiness” and “sadness” based on certain key words.

Key words like "sun" and "yoga" (yay! happy!) and sad words such as "hate" and "hell." (How about "another fucking rent hike"?)

(Also. Tricky: A word like "Woooooo!" could be seen as happy or sad, depending on who is on the receiving end of the Woooooo!, if researchers had actually measured Woooooo!)

The data found that the largest concentration of happy tweets came from the Times Square region. (Tourists: duh)

Elsewhere?

While most of Manhattan south of Central Park had people tweeting happily, there were pockets of unhappiness in the East Village, Chelsea and the area around City Hall. There were also a large number of sad tweets coming from the area around the United Nations.

No word if researchers measured emoticons.

An East Village resident to root for during the Academy Awards on Sunday night

"How to Survive a Plague" is one of the five films nominated for Best Documentary Feature in the 2013 Academy Awards.

Here's the official synopsis:

"How to Survive a Plague" is the story of two coalitions — ACT UP and TAG (Treatment Action Group) — whose activism and innovation turned AIDS from a death sentence into a manageable condition. Despite having no scientific training, these self-made activists infiltrated the pharmaceutical industry and helped identify promising new drugs, moving them from experimental trials to patients in record time. With unfettered access to a treasure trove of never-before-seen archival footage from the 1980s and '90s, filmmaker David France puts the viewer smack in the middle of the controversial actions, the heated meetings, the heartbreaking failures, and the exultant breakthroughs of heroes in the making.

France is a longtime resident of East Seventh Street. He has been writing about AIDS since 1982, and as a journalist, his work has appeared in The New York Times, Newsweek, GQ, and New York magazine.



"How to Survive a Plague" marks his directorial debut. He's currently working on a book about the AIDS epidemic for publication later this year. In an interview published yesterday at Time magazine, he talks about what it was like to hear the news of the nomination:

It was thrilling. I guess probably everybody would say that, but for me the thrill was that we ran this massive outreach and education campaign around it. And all of this is an effort to give the film a life of its own and to establish it in the marketplace of ideas so that people will turn to it for this history. And an Oscar nomination gives it that much more standing and makes it more probable that it will reach wide audiences for a long time.

Here are some different ways to see the film, which is now on DVD.

Also, thanks to the commenter for pointing out this interview on The Brian Lehrer Show. And Claude Peck left the URL for his review in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

H/T Dave on 7th

Reader report: Will a rent hike force out East Village Shoe Repair on St. Mark's Place?

[Via StyleBubble UK]

A tipster passes along word that the cobblers at East Village Shoe Repair on St. Mark's Place may be forced to close or relocate after the landlord hit them with a big rent hike. While nothing is final just yet, they are apparently not very optimistic. (This article from 2006 noted that their rent was $4,000 a month for the 100-square-feet of space.)

A cobbler has been in this space since 1985; Belarus natives Eugene Finkelberg and Boris Zuborev took over in 1994. (Finkelberg is the original owner's nephew.) Aside from quality repair work, the two are well-known for their custom shoe creations... the spot to get the EV creepers.


[Via StyleBubble UK]

A post from April 2010 on Style Bubble notes:

" ...characters like Boris and Eugene are diminishing in cities... that encounters in grimy holes where they gesture to their faded albums with shoe polish fingers are few and far between... I maybe over-romanticising but I did feel ever so slightly enrichened by a visit to this particular shoe repair joint..."

Not sure what kind of tenant the landlord is aiming for in such a small space ... Of course, as previously noted, with 51 Astor Place and its 12-floors of incoming office workers looming in the background ... I wonder about the future of the remaining hole-in-the-wall-type shops along the block...



Bonus Barney.

[Photo by Bob Arihood from 2010]

For further reading:
EV Creepers (Jeremiah's Vanishing New York)

Watch a vintage Miller Lite commercial filmed at Vazac's

Hey, it's former NFL greats Bubba Smith and Dick Butkus in a Miller Lite spot from 1984 ... filmed at Vazac's/7B/Horsehoe Bar (whatever you prefer) ... Anyway! Less filling!

Thanks to @VaughnVance for finding this.

More from East Houston and Katz's circa 1986

Last week, we shared a photo from EVG reader Paul Dougherty looking at East Houston and Ludlow in 1986 before the onslaught of luxury apartments and hotels...

Flashback!



Paul found a few more from his archives showing Katz's...

...from 1981...



... and 1986...



... and the scene right before he moved from his apartment in the spring of 2007...



Meanwhile, EVG reader Corey shared a current photo that shows the obvious changes in the skyline...



A little half-assed with my Photoshopping, but maybe you get the idea...


[Click image to enlarge]

The Bruce High Quality Foundation University settles in on Avenue A

Been meaning to note this. You may have noticed the signage — BHQFU — on the third floor at 34 Avenue A near East Third Street...

The space is serving as home to The Bruce High Quality Foundation University (BHQFU), "a learning experiment where artists work together to manifest creative, productive, resistant, useless, and demanding interactions between art and the world."

Here's more via an article last fall in the GalleristNY, which describes BHQFU as "the mostly anonymous artist collective founded by a group of Cooper Union alumni." The unaccredited art school started in 2009 on West Broadway as a response to the "$200,000-debt-model of art education."


[The third-floor classroom, via Facebook]

Spring sessions on Avenue A include "You Watching Me Googling You." Find the school's website here.

And so, for now, this closes the book on 34 Avenue A, home to some angry-neighbor angst in recent years... from the closure of Mo Pitkin's ... to the opening and closing of flip-cup mecca Aces & Eights ... to CB3 rejecting all plans for a bar-restaurant-performance space here.

Today, the building is home to Ruff Club, a dog-friendly social club, a karate center and an artist collective.

Progress?

Winter Friday flashback: Price melting on 'Soho-style' igloo in Tompkins Square Park

On Fridays this winter, and probably spring and summer ... we'll post one of the 16,000-plus EVG, uh, posts from yesteryear, like this one from March 1, 2010...

-------

On Friday, we wrote about a new listing that popped up on Prudential Douglas Elliman for a "Soho-style" igloo right in the heart of East Greenwich Village in Tompkins Square Park.

On Friday, the 15-square-foot igloo was priced at $1.5 million ($100K per square foot!)


However, today, the price has been chopped down to $500K!

Here's the listing:

This fully original Soho igloo is ready to go at a stunning and spacious 15 square feet!! Located in a new igloo and facing southeast off the Park you will enjoy the setting sun, quiet nights, and all the space!! The ground has been white washed for a tasteful but artful look. There is a flat screen TV nook that has been smartly placed in the living space so the TV will flow seamlessly against the snow. Closets everywhere, bath and a half, open kitchen round out this one-of-a-kind one igloo flex two loft space. The igloo is a condo so subletting and renting are permitted. Pets are welcome!

According to Streeteasy, this property originally went on the market around this time last year, but was quickly pulled several warmer days later...

There was an open igloo this past Friday...


...where potential igloo-buyers discovered that the space may be best suited for those under say, 3 feet tall.



If you're interested, then I urge you to hurry. The temperatures are expected in the mid 40s today...

A pigeon a day keeps the...

Today in Tompkins Square Park... via Bobby Williams.

Noted

From the EV Grieve inbox...

MAYOR MICHAEL R. BLOOMBERG WILL DELIVER COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS AT THE COOPER UNION’S 154th GRADUATION CEREMONY

New York – We are proud and delighted that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has agreed to deliver the commencement address at The Cooper Union’s 154th graduation ceremony in May, said Jamshed Bharucha, President of The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. At commencement, Mayor Bloomberg will receive the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters (honorary).

Commencement 2013 is scheduled for Tuesday, May 29th in The Great Hall of The Cooper Union, East 7th Street at Third and Fourth Avenues, New York.

“Mayor Bloomberg’s transformational leadership to improve education, the cityscape and the built environment, as well as public health, while encouraging smart and sustainable economic growth distinguishes his administration. His persuasive advocacy for gun control and immigration reform resonates across the country. His determination for New York to thrive as a world class applied science center will draw the best and the brightest for decades to come. His record and vision provide an example for our graduates who want to contribute their talents to New York and beyond. We are honored to have him deliver the keynote address at this year’s commencement,” said President Bharucha.