Rare bird

Here are shots of a Black Crown Night Heron ... a rare bird to be found in Tompkins Square Park... photos by Bobby Williams...

Feeling 'Blue'?

Lene Lovich with "Blue Hotel" circa 1982.

Village Fishmonger starting Monday night delivery service to Tompkins Square Bagels

As we've noted, Tompkins Square Bagels owner Christopher Pugliese has expressed interest in opening a fish market somewhere in the East Village.

Until that happens, here's an interim solution... Starting Monday night from 6-8, Tompkins Square Bagels at 165 Avenue A will serve as a pick-up location for anyone who orders from Village Fishmonger.

Samantha Lee, an owner of Village Fishmonger, which launched last fall, said that they are "a sustainable seafood company in NYC that sources local and responsibly harvested seafood."

It works like Community Supported Agriculture, delivering locally harvested seafood to members on a weekly basis. Tompkins Square Bagels is VF's first East Village pick-up location. (They also do a series with the Washington Square CSA at the St Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery Greenmarket on Tuesdays this summer.)

You can find more details about how all this works at the Village Fishmonger website.

Lee, a former East Village resident, told us that "there is a need for more access to better seafood product, which we definitely felt when we lived in the area."

Headless stuffed animal body found in Tompkins Square Park

EVG reader Chris M. made this grizzly grisly discovery this afternoon in Tompkins Square Park. No one has been blamed — yet.

Checking in on the new front gate at Tompkins Square Park

There was welding activity yesterday at the Park's front gate on Avenue A at St. Mark's Place ... the one that dude in a station wagon apparently crashed into on June 27.

The above photo shows (half of) the gate this morning. (And it may not actually be a new gate, just new here.) Anyway! It appears the gate is working — it prevented this bottle of Stella from entering last night... (or early this morning).

The disappearing Mary Help of Christians

An East Village resident has been keeping tabs on the destruction at the former Mary Help of Christians lot... workers are taking down the rectory on East 12th Street first to make way for the new residential development...

Wednesday...








Thursday...





...three stories gone by the end of the day...



...and the garage with the familiar Mary Help of Christians mural is gone. Here's a last look yesterday... next to the machine that eventually crushed it...




And from the ground, a few end-of-day-shots via Bobby Williams... not much else to say.

This weekend: 25th Annual Tompkins Square Park Riot Reunion concerts

The 25th Annual Tompkins Square Park Riot Reunion concerts continue this weekend...

Bands performing Saturday:
-Porno Dracula
-Coffin Daggers (Featuring Victor of Nausea)
-David Peel
-ISM
-Bambi Killers
-Hammerbrain

Sunday:
-Iconicide
-Urban Waste
-Nihilistics
-Sic F*cks
-Reagan Youth
-Antidote

Here is the Facebook event page for more details.

If you can't make these, then there's also a concert Sunday night at the Pyramid...



Also, the Tompkins Square Park riot is one of the subjects covered during the first film festival from The Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space (MoRUS) tomorrow and Sunday ...

August 3: 25th Annual Tompkins Square Riot Reunion Films!
Featuring "Your House is Mine" (filmmaker Carolyn McCaughey in attendance!), "Squat or Rot" and a Paper Tiger TV special on the demolition of the 5th Street squat.
Paper Tiger TV details.
@ MoRUS (155 Avenue C)

August 4: 25th Annual Tompkins Square Riot Reunion Films!
Featuring a special historical slideshow presented by Seth Tobocman and "Tompkins Square Park: Operation Class War on the Lower East Side"
@ MoRUS (155 Avenue C)

For more details about the film festival here.

Karl Fischer-designed condos seem to be a big draw on East 12th Street

[Yesterday]

The listings went live in late June for 427 E. 12th St., home of the Karl Fischer-architected condos between Avenue A and First Avenue... There's still work left to do here, as you can see.

In any event, there are 10 units that range in price from $850,000 for a one-bedroom home to $2.395 for the penthouse. And for some reason we looked at Streeteasy and saw that of the eight units on the market, five were already in contract.



Not sure what the big draw is here (epoxy finishes?) ... Nice amenities, sure.


[Some day at 427]

To the listing:

Residences feature sleek concrete floors with epoxy finishes and floor to ceiling double pane windows. Several residences are complimented with a private outdoor space that range in size. The custom designed chefs kitchen is finished with walnut veneer and satin lacquer cabinetry, Caesar stone countertops, back painted glass, and is fully equipped with stainless steel appliances by Fischer & Paykel. Bathrooms are appointed with oversized bathtubs, custom built vanities, glass enclosed frameless showers, and Duravit & Kohler fixtures throughout.

At any rate, residences will need those double pane windows during the impending construction at Douglas Steiner's massive new development down the block.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Karl Fischer designing new East 12th Street residence

427 E. 12th St. back from the dead?

Workers making a pit stop at incoming Karl Fischer-designed building on East 12th Street

Listings arrive for Karl Fischer-designed luxury homes at 427 E. 12th St.

What it costs to get away to the country on East 9th Street

If you have a lot of money and yearn to escape to the country without leaving East Ninth Street, then — well!

This house between Avenue A and First Avenue might be for you!

To the Town listing:

Country-House-in-the-City + location, location, location! Prime East Village Entire 4 story historic Manhattan Townhouse + Enormous densely green garden on one of the best East Village blocks. Walking distance to Astor Place, Union Square and major subway lines. This 6 bedrooms & 4 bathrooms house can be a 1 family or 2 family. Features include gorgeous floor to ceiling French windows, Classic parlor floor dining/living room with high ceilings, diagonally laid Victorian wood floors & the French windows... large, sunny extra atelier or work room. Available furnished or partially furnished. Country House in City is perfect description.

This unique house has been featured in Law & Order and movies.

And the asking price? $14,000. [Added: A month to rent.]



Or you could just take Metro North to, say, Sloatsburg for the weekend.

Here comes Jillery

As we noted back on June 21, Jillery, the jewelry and home accessories shop, is moving from its current home on East 10th Street to the corner of East Seventh Street and Avenue B.

The 10th Street location closed yesterday... and the folks from Jillery have been filling up the new shop... and, as this photo by Dave on 7th shows, they're working on the exterior as well.

No opening date for the new location just yet. (Per the Jillery Facebook page: " Hopefully we will be open soon. We are working on it!")

The corner spot was last home to most recently home to Amaran.

Report: 90-year-old Blatt Billiards leaving Broadway

Blatt Billiards, a pool table manufacturer, is leaving its longtime home at 809 Broadway near East 12th Street. As The Real Deal first reported yesterday, the building is changing hands for $24 million. The deal includes an additional 7,045 square feet of air rights.

Blatt was a longtime tenant here before buying the building in 1972. The manufacturing portion of the building will move to New Jersey while Blatt looks for a showroom in Hell's Kitchen, per The Real Deal.

The closing is expecting to happen early next year. The new owner is only ID'd as 809 Broadway Associates.

As The Real Deal noted, the building is "one of the last relics of the area’s manufacturing past."

There's now a 7-Eleven conveniently located next door.

Remembering the Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge

On Monday, Gothamist had a post on the new Brooklyn Roasting Company that opened at the former home of the Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge ... at Flushing and Washington Avenues opposite an entrance to the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

We had been to the place, which was built in 1907, a few times... and, despite being way out of bounds in terms of typical EVG coverage, we decided to write about it in November 2010 upon hearing that the bar closed.

An excerpt.

------

[A]t first glance inside the Navy Yard, the place seems like your average rundown neighborhood bar. A few regulars are milling about, playing pool. The bartender is cordial. (I'm sort of blending the different trips into one post here....it was always the same.) WBLS is on a little too loudly on the radio. The TV is also on seemingly just as loud — one of those CBS shows that I've never watched on Thursday nights. (CSINCS?)

Eventually around 10 p.m., a lot more women are suddenly in the bar... they walk in, talk with the bartender, spend a lot of time in the women's room. Soon, there are anywhere from five to 10 women va-va-va-vooming around in lingerie, bikinis, etc. Oh! They're all very outgoing, especially when there are just two of you in the bar.

Every few minutes Delicious or Cinnamon or Diamond walks up and asks again if you'd like a dance. No thanks! Two minutes later... There's not much of a chance of sitting here for, say, a few hours drinking without purchasing a $10 dance. (And they don't have change for a $20, oddly enough.) So just sit there in your stool at the bar for the lapdance and wonder why Laurence Fishburne decided to do CSINCS.

------

Oh, and here how the place is looking today...


[Photo via Gothamist]

Previously on EV Grieve:
At the Navy Yard Cocktail Lounge (aka, RIP)

No pool, no ping pong

Oh, and no movie.

Tompkins Square Park this afternoon via Bobby Williams.

'Rocky Horror Picture Show' cancelled tonight, and Brad is still an asshole

From the Films in Tompkins Facebook page:

UPDATE: Unfortunately, tonight's screening of THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW has been canceled due to bad weather.

Back next Thursday for another rainout!

This marks the fifth film this summer to be KO'd by the rain or threat of rain.

A new front gate for Tompkins Square Park

Back in the early-morning hours of June 27, a man driving a station wagon crashed through the front gate of Tompkins Square Park on Avenue A and St. Mark's Place. (We never did hear more about this incident.)

Anyway, say goodbye to the various strips of tape and barriers that have been here in recent weeks ... EVG contributor Derek Berg notes that more permanent gate work is in progress this morning...

The incredible plan to build 'Space Invader-esque residential towers' by the Williamsburg Bridge

A reader shares a link to a Wired article titled "Maps of Unrealized City Plans Reveal What Might Have Been."

The piece looks at city plans that (thankfully, in some cases) never came to be... all via Andrew Lynch's Tumblr called Hyperreal Cartography & The Unrealized City ... it's loaded with city maps "collected from libraries, municipal archives, and dark corners of the Internet."

Of some local interest... the above plans from the 1950s-1960s ... it was an idea hatched after Robert Moses didn't get his Lower Manhattan Expressway off the ground...

"[T]he Ford Foundation asked architect Paul Rudolph to envision an urban expressway that was better integrated into the city. Rudolph drew a futuristic city with soaring, Space Invader-esque residential towers around the Manhattan and Williamsburg Bridges. The highway would wind beneath a linear city, and modular housing units would be connected by a pod-like monorail system."

Apparently these plans weren't entirely serious, but entertaining nonetheless.

Sort of like the renderings for the Domino Sugar Factory.


[Via Curbed]

Renovations start at future home of Mee Noodle Shop on First Avenue

As you may know, Mee Noodle Shop is returning to the East Village after a seven-year absence ... just a few storefronts away from its former home on First Avenue at East 13th Street.

Anyway, EVG regular dwg notes that renovations have finally started on the space, previously occupied until March by Birdbath Neighborhood Green Bakery.

In June, Mee's Joyce Chi told The Villager that the restaurant will be reopening in about five months. So if you want to do the math...

Previously on EV Grieve:
Starbucks confirmed for 219 First Ave., former home to Allen Ginsberg's favorite Chinese restaurant

Mee Noodle Shop returning to First Avenue (28 comments)

The Art and Music of Peter Missing on Avenue A

An exhibit featuring Peter Missing's work starts tonight at the Art on A Gallery at 24 Avenue A near East Second Street... up through Sept. 26.

There's a post opening-reception event at 2A at 9, with projections of The Missing Foundation on the wall across the street... The Facebook Event page is here.

Lantern Thai Kitchen closes on Avenue A; Bangkok-based Somtum Der coming soon

Lantern Thai Kitchen has closed at 85 Avenue A... and a sign for its replacement is up (you could actually read it if this photo wasn't blurry). The Bangkok-based Somtum Der will be opening here soon...



The eatery is the first in the United States for Thanaruek Laoraowirodge, who is growing a mini-empire of restaurants in Bangkok.

Here's a quote from him in BK (Bangkok) magazine:

"People in New York already have a good perception of Thai food. They are not just familiar with tom yam, but regional dishes too."

Here's a 3-star (out of 5) review of Somtum Der via BK:

Together with Chef Kornthanut Thongnum, Khon Kaen-native Thanaruek Laoraowirodge has brought his Isaan roots to the capital in the shape of this somtam-focused restaurant whose objective is to steer our taste buds back towards Northern Isaan, and away from the sweeter flavors that Bangkokians so cherish.

And!

Of the score of somtam varieties available, standouts include the tam sua Sakon Nakhon (B65), which comes with freshwater crab and kratin beans, and the tam pla tu khao man (B85), which comes with mackerel and is served with a comforting side of rice cooked in coconut milk. In very different ways, they’re both exemplary of what Thai food does best: balancing a range of flavors and textures. Of course, there’s also a long list of usual suspects, from laabs to tom saep, all equally well executed. We’re less impressed with the deep-fried or grilled meats.

Lantern Thai Kitchen opened in January 2012, replacing Cafetasia, which sported the 100-ounce beer tube.

The Lantern remains open on Second Avenue at 18th Street.

Avenue A 7-Eleven expected to be completed by yesterday

The gut renovation of the space that previously housed Bar on A and Angels & Kings has entered the 11th month... workers are fitting the address here on Avenue A and East 11th Street for a 7-Eleven, of course...

A quick check yesterday shows that the work is expected to be completed by July 31, 2013, aka yesterday.



At this rate, the crew will have the place ready by July 31, 2014.

However, this photo that Bobby Williams took on Tuesday shows some slight progress...



The 7-Eleven franchise website still shows that the store will be ready for Go-Go Taquitos® action in October. This location is still without an owner.

Previously.