Saturday, September 16, 2017

1st LinkNYC kiosk arrives on St. Mark's Place



This blessed event happened yesterday just west of Second Avenue near the former 7-Eleven.

Previously

Major design flaw of the early Macintosh finally revealed



They do not fit into city trash cans...



Fifth Street at the Bowery this morning.

Also, can someone please ID this model?

Updated 10:20 am

Thank you Richard! (See comments.)

This is an Apple Multiple Scan 15AV CRT monitor from 1996.

Friday, September 15, 2017

Gorillas in the mist (on the Bowery)



... and making music at Second Street... photo by Lola Saenz...

The power of 'One'



Hüsker Dü from 1987 with "Could You Be the One?"

RIP Grant Hart.

So long Cher, the willow tree of La Plaza Cultural



Workers arrived this morning at La Plaza Cultural to remove the willow tree in the southwest corner of the community garden here on Avenue C and Ninth Street.

The tree, nicknamed Cher, was in bad shape, as this shot of the rotting trunk shows...



EVG correspondent Steven shared these photos...











... and later via Bobby Williams...



Previously on EV Grieve:
A wake for the last willow trees at La Plaza Cultural

At the Weeping Willow Wake

Jimmy Webb will make dreams come true with new rock 'n' roll boutique I Need More


[Photo of Jimmy Webb for EVG by Walter Wlodarczyk]

Jimmy Webb, a familiar figure in the East Village during his long tenure as the manager and buyer at Trash & Vaudeville, is opening a rock 'n'roll boutique next month on the Lower East Side at 75A Orchard St. between Broome and Grand. Webb gave me a quick overview about the shop, called I Need More, which opens on Oct. 13.

Why did you decide to return to the retail business?
What else would I do? In my heart I never really left.

I’ve never really looked as myself as a seller of anything or even as someone in the retail business. What I do is I make dreams come true and I love doing it! I simply find what’s inside people, I help bring it out, and then I help them dress it up! I guess that’s the retail business, but the word "business" sounds so disconnected from "dream maker," and I’d rather make "dreams come true!"

Why did you pick the Lower East Side for the shop?
I didn’t pick the Lower East Side, or any special place for I Need More. I was very open to where the rock 'n' roll angels were leading me when I finally decided to open a store. A certain group of friends, I call them angels, guided me to the clarity that I needed to open a brick-and-mortar store. Loving all of New York City I was very open to anywhere in Manhattan. My heart and spirit is in ALL of New York City.

Of course the Lower East Side is a HUGE part of my life since I ran away and arrived in the city in 1975. So I wasn’t the least bit surprised when that second batch of angels ended up leading me right to 75 Orchard Street — 75A in fact! How cool is that? I take that leap of faith and run away to New York City in 1975 as a 16-year-old boy. Decades later another leap of faith leaving everything I know and ending up at 75A Orchard Street.

What can people expect from I Need More?
It’s about the spirit of New York City — past, present and future, And also the spirit of what art, music, and everything else that colors the world! It will be about everything that is real, raw, energetic, welcoming, passionate, dirty, beautiful and most of all — honest!

I’m a firm believer in "we are the future.” That "no future” pessimism doesn’t cut it with me. Like Joey Ramone singing “What a Wonderful World” or Iggy singing every song that Iggy sings. I Need More aims to please with every heartbeat within it. It’s here to make dreams come true.

Thanks to Walter Wlodarczyk for the photo. Find more of his work here.

Block Party on, 9th Street



Time again (tomorrow!) for the annual block party on Ninth Street between Avenue A and First Avenue.

Here are details via the EVG inbox...

Annual 9th Street A-1 Block Association Block Party

Saturday, Sept. 1​6​, 11 a.m. – 5 p.m. (no rain date)

Live Music (from noon - 4 p.m.)

MUSIC LINE UP:
Ginga Pura
EV-3
Sea Kelp (Originals)
Ron and his Personal Demons
BroadBand

Resident artists, crafts people, and photographers will be showing and selling their work, and residents will be selling a la "stoop sale" — antiques, bric-a-brac, clothing, accessories, music, jewelry, etc.

Block businesses include:

• Beetle Bug (florist), Enchantments, Flower Power (herbs), Love Gang (clothing), Mr. Throwback (vintage clothing and accessories), Ollie's Place (cat adoption), Pink Olive (gifts), Polytima (jewelry), Puppy Love Kitty Kat (pet supplies), Reason Outpost (clothing)

• Restaurants/Cafes: Cagen, Good Beer, Superiority Burger, Tacos Morales, Thursday Kitchen, Whitman's, Zucker Bakery

• Hair Salons/Barbers: Crops for Girls, Lovemore & Do, Maria Mok Salon, Neighborhood Barber, Tsumiki Salon

The Mount Sinai Health System wants to hear from you (in this survey anyway)

I heard yesterday from both the offices of Sen. Hoylman and City Council member Rosie Mendez ... Mount Sinai Beth Israel has extended its online survey through Sept 20.

You can find the 10-question survey here. (It's billed as a "Community Health Needs Assessment for Mount Sinai Downtown.") There's also more info on the landing page about Mount Sinai's plans.

As you know, the Mount Sinai Health System is in the midst of its years-long project to rebuild Mount Sinai Beth Israel, transitioning to a network of smaller facilities throughout lower Manhattan.

East Village Vintage Collective celebrates 2 years on 12th Street tonight with some 'terrible' offerings


[Image via Instagram]

Via the East Village Vintage Collective Instagram account:

Join us for our two-year anniversary party 🎉 featuring the fucking terrible art and video show, tarot card reading by @gaylestacher, free drinks, & 20 percent off store wide! Starts at 7 p.m. Thanks to our amazing customers who have helped a small business survive over these last two years!

The shop is at 545 E. 12th St. between Avenue A and Avenue B.



Previously on EV Grieve:
At the East Village Vintage Collective

Amid claims of being a rent-stabilized tenant, Raphael Toledano faces eviction from his home


[Photo outside Toledano's apartment building from May]

The Real Deal has the story:

Hyperkinetic landlord Raphael Toledano, whose alleged methods in evicting tenants from rent-stabilized apartments made him enemy number one of the New York City tenant movement, faces eviction at his $13,800 a month Upper West Side home, where he claims to be a rent-stabilized resident, court records show.

Some local reaction:

“This has got to be a joke, right?” said SaMi Chester, a tenant organizer at the Cooper Square Committee who actively works with tenants in Toledano’s buildings; they frequently claim they are being harassed by the 27-year-old landlord. “Here’s a guy who’s built his career on screwing over rent-stabilized tenants. Now he’s doing that?”

And some background:

Toledano, who recently filed for bankruptcy on a portfolio of multifamily buildings in the East Village amid claims he was overleveraged, essentially operated a real estate business whose model depended on vacancy deregulation to crank up rent rolls.

Read the whole Real Deal story here.

According to public records, Toledano is scheduled to appear in New York County Civil Court, 111 Centre St., Monday morning at 9:30. (The Court part is called F, Room 830.)

Previously on EV Grieve:
Foreclosure notice arrives on Raphael Toledano-owned building on 12th Street

Claim: Landlord of 444 E. 13th St. threatened 'to drop dynamite on the building'

Cleaning up 444 E. 13th St.

Report: State investigating East Village landlord Raphael Toledano

Health Department to inspect Raphael Toledano's East Village properties for toxic levels of lead dust

Foreclosure notice arrives on Raphael Toledano-owned building on 12th Street

Report: Raphael Toledano files for Chapter 11; $145 million deal for EV portfolio is off the table

Raphael Toledano tenants take to Midtown streets to speak out against their landlord and his lenders

East Village tenants pay landlord Raphael Toledano a visit at his Upper West Side home

Thursday, September 14, 2017

Thursday's parting shot



Photo on Seventh Street today via Derek Berg. (Crews were out filming something called "Detective Chinatown 2.")

Noted



Noted... aka Citizen app crime report of day. (The app has had its share of controversy.)

P.S. Do not know how this ended.

H/T @Frosty_Bites

Tree down on 12th Street near Avenue A



EVG regular Greg Masters shares this... a 20-year-old tree on the north side of 12th Street just west of Avenue A was upended late this morning. No eyewitnesses but it apparently was uprooted by a truck backing into a parking space. Police were soon on the scene and the tree was later cut into pieces...

Slowing down the jackhammering on Avenue A



At St. Mark's Place this morning ... via Grant Shaffer...

I Am a Rent-Stabilized Tenant

East Village resident Susan Schiffman has been photographing the apartments of rent-stabilized tenants living in the East Village for her Instagram account, I Am a Rent Stabilized Tenant. She will share some of the photos here for this ongoing EVG feature.



Photos and text by Susan Schiffman

Tenant: Tanya, since 1985

In 1978, Tanya came to NYC from Ann Arbor, Mich., to attend NYU. She lived in the dorms Weinstein and then Brittany. There were only three dorms back then.

After graduation in 1982, Tanya looked for an apartment in the East Village. Tanya and I reminisced about how you could walk around the neighborhood and ask supers if there were any apartments available in their building. This is how she found her apartment on 13th Street.

She met a pop star and moved to London to be with him, giving up her apartment in the process. They came back to New York, where she moved in and out of 10 different places. She found her current apartment through friends in 1985.

Tanya loves that all of the moldings in her apartment are original. She also loves that each room by law had to have a door and a window to be classified as a room.

She and her apartment are very inspired by Heywood-Wakefield Modern Furniture. She is obsessed with Hawaiian textiles. She has recovered her couch about five times. Tanya has made all of the pillows, curtains, duvet covers and reupholstery in her home. She repainted the floor eight times with a tiny brush.















If you're interested in inviting Susan in to photograph your apartment for an upcoming post, then you may contact her via this email.

La Plaza's grand willow tree comes down tomorrow



Back in July, officials at La Plaza Cultural announced that the last two willow trees in the community garden on the southwest corner of Avenue C and Ninth Street would have to be removed.

The trees, nicknamed Cher and Krusty, are rotting, and may be in danger of falling during a storm. La Plaza gardeners have said that the trees are more than 40 years old.

The Parks Department announced that they will have the larger of the two willows — the one near Avenue C nicknamed Cher — removed tomorrow morning. (The second willow, Krusty, located near the gazebo, is also in poor shape and will likely need to come down at some point.)

During the work on Friday, La Plaza will be closed.

Last night, La Plaza gardeners removed any lawn furniture in Cher's path ... and said their final goodbyes.

Rev. Billy presided over a Weeping Willow Wake on July 9.


[Photo on July 9 by Steven]

Updated 5 p.m.

EVG regular Jose Garcia shares some flyers that someone placed at La Plaza...





Previously on EV Grieve:
A wake for the last willow trees at La Plaza Cultural

At the Weeping Willow Wake

A letter for new NYU students: 'think good thoughts about yourself and others'

EVG reader Lori Kohn shared this letter that she spotted taped to a light post on Ninth Street and Third Avenue...


[Click on image for more detail]

The letter of support reads in part:

The struggles among new students at NYU are no doubt taking different forms. You might be struggling with how to meet friends or how to socialize with people who drink when you don't, or how to get involved in something, anything, when time seems so precious, etc. Some of you are wondering if everyone's smarter than you or if you're smart enough to be at NYU. Some of you are stressed with performance anxieties, with being cool. Some of you are just missing a home-cooked meal.

The struggles are real and sometimes hard, but they are normal. They are not a sign of a problem, but just the normal challenges of transitions to a new phase in one's life.

Dismiss any idea that your enrollment at NYU was a fluke. You belong here.

My suggestion: think good thoughts about yourself and others. Relax. And through it all, know that you are where you belong.

The letter is signed by "your neighbor," Mr. Steck.

Report: Threats made in ongoing battle over 97 2nd Ave.

Raphael Toledano continues to build his impressive tapestry of quotable quotes in his tenure as an East Village landlord.


His latest keepsake soundbite came during the ongoing battle over 97 Second Ave. between Toledano and Michael Shah’s Delshah Capital. Both landlords are claiming ownership of the 11-unit building. (It's complicated.)

The Real Deal has all the details about the legal drama here.

In August ... Toledano filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on the property and tried to procure a buyer. According to court documents filed by Shah, Toledano also used that time to threaten and extort him. Toledano threatened to instruct the tenants to withhold rent, according to the documents, and told Shah, “I will bury you, literally. I will bury this building and make sure of it.”

The 6-story building between Sixth Street and Fifth Street was one of the first East Village properties purchased by Toledano. Public records show that Toledano paid $4.95 million for it in April 2014. Toledano said in the bankruptcy protection filing that the property is valued at $15.1 million, per the Commercial Observer.

As for the status of Tolednao and his other neighborhood properties, The Real Deal reported:

The 27-year-old landlord is awaiting approval for the sale of the deeds of 15 distressed East Village properties to lender Madison Realty Capital, which recently replaced him as property manager on the buildings.



Previously on EV Grieve:
Claim: Landlord of 444 E. 13th St. threatened 'to drop dynamite on the building'

NYC's first Nutella Cafe coming to University and 13th Street



The retail space in the base of the in-progress condoplex on 13th Street and University Place will house the city's first Nutella Cafe. (There's a Nutella kiosk in the Eataly food hall.)

According to the Commercial Observer, who first reported on this yesterday, the cafe and coffee bar will occupy 2,200 square feet here at 116 University Place.

The first U.S. Nutella Cafe, in Chicago, "serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner, including waffles, croissants, crepes, panini, and family-style fondue," per Eater.

As previously reported, the Adjmi Architects-designed seven-story condoplex will feature one unit per floor. The starting prices for the homes are $6 million.

The corner previously housed University Place Gourmet as well as several adjacent storefronts, including Bennie Louie Chinese Laundry.

Developer Ranger Properties paid $22 million for the lot.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Major changes coming to University Place and East 13th Street

Report: Incoming condos for 13th Street and University Place will start at $6 million


[Photo from June 2015]

Wednesday, September 13, 2017

Wednesday's parting shot



Christo in Tompkins Square Park today. Photo by Bobby Williams.

Goggla said that Christo's been molting and looking pretty raggedy of late, but he should be back to his sleek self soon.