A Saturday walk through the East Village

There was a movement to arbitrarily consider this past weekend as the unofficial official start of the summer after that soggy Memorial Day Weekend.

And it was suitably summery with temps in the 90s. EVG contributor Stacie Joy was out and about throughout the day and shared these photos from around the neighborhood...

... events that day included the Nexus Flea at its new location on First Avenue and Second Street...

The zine and plant swap at the First Street Garden...

Open Garden Day with Art Around the Hood...

... and in the early evening, Pinc Louds were planning to play a show in Tompkins Square Park. However, the NYPD and Parks Enforcement Patrol had other ideas... as they have been cracking down on amplified shows, vending, gathering, etc., etc.

In any event, Pinc Louds moved on to play at La Plaza Cultural on Ninth Street and Avenue C. Photos to follow in another post.

Openings: 7th Street Burger on 7th Street

7th Street Burger opened this past Thursday here at 91 E. Seventh St. just east of First Avenue.

On Instagram, their motto is "going back to simple." As such, you can see that the menu consists of just a few items — cheeseburgers, an Impossible burger, fries, Mexican Coca-Cola and water...

Owner Kevin Rezvani was previously operating a similar venture in his native New Jersey ... where he opened his first burger joint, Diesel & Duke, a few years back while he was a student at Rutgers. (He recently sold the business, now with five locations, to start 7th Street Burger.)

The quick-serve space is open Thursday through Sunday starting at 4 p.m. for takeout or delivery. (There are also a few tables outside.)

 

The storefront was previously the longtime home to Caracas Arepa Bar, which closed last fall.

787 Coffee makes it official at 159 2nd Ave.

A quick follow-up to our post last Wednesday about 787 Coffee signing a lease for two storefronts on the southwest corner of Second Avenue and 10th Street (officially 159 Second Ave.). 

The 787 signage is now up on the space to the west ... the former Third Rail Coffee will serve as 787's retail space, while the former dry cleaners next door will be an office for the company. 

With this opening later this summer, 787 will have four East Village locations, joining 131 E. Seventh St., 101 Second Ave. and 319. E. 14th St. (The company currently has eight coffee shops citywide.) 

The Seventh Street store, which opened in October 2018, was the first for co-owners Brandon Pena and Sam Sepulveda, who wanted to bring Puerto Rican coffee to NYC. (And 787 takes its names from Puerto Rico's area code.)

Third Rail Coffee did not reopen here following the PAUSE of March 2020. Next door, Danny's Cleaners merged their business with Lois Cleaners on the southeast corner of 10th Street and Third Avenue.

Thanks to Steven for the photo!

Mocha Red promises a 'Tulum Meets Wynwood Experience' on 4th Avenue

Temp signage arrived last week for Mocha Red at 127 Fourth Ave. between 12th Street and 13th Street.

We're told that this is a new concept from the folks behind Mocha Burger. 

And the concept? A steakhouse and mixology bar that will provide "a Tulum Meets Wynwood Experience" ...

BarBacon was here for nearly two years before bowing out during the pandemic. 

H/T Upper West Sider!

First sign of Yoshino New York on the Bowery

It has taken a while, but we have our first sign of Yoshino New York, the forthcoming sushi omakase restaurant here at 342 Bowery between Great Jones and Bond...

Master sushi chef Tadashi Yoshida first announced this project for No. 342 in the fall of 2018... with work starting on the space in August 2019, per BoweryBoogie. The opening was delayed, then came the pandemic. 

In the past year, Yoshida spent time in Japan, operating Yoshino New York from part of the Sushi Sagawa space in Tokyo.

The restaurant now has a September debut slated for the Bowery, per its Instagram account.

No. 342 was last home, in 2017, to the pop-up House of Fluff ... before that, we had a Subway (sandwich shop). The Subway opened here in late 2009, taking over after Downtown Music Gallery moved to Monroe Street. Plans for a restaurant here called Poke Run never materialized.

The return of Stomp

ICYMI: Stomp returns to the Orpheum Theatre on July 20. Tickets go on sale starting June 21.

As Deadline noted, "Stomp will be among the city's first Off-Broadway productions to resume performances post-pandemic shutdown." Proof of vaccination will be required for entry, per reports.

The show, featuring an array of "body percussionists," is now in its 26th year here on Second Avenue between Seventh Street and St. Mark's Place.

Photo from March by Steven

New deli to be the toast of 9th Street?

Signage progress here at 105 E. Ninth St.! 

As we've been noting, a bagel shop-deli is in the works here between Third Avenue and Fourth Avenue dating back to November. The previous signage — three in total — led to some confusion. Was this Bagel Deli, Everything Bagel or Toasted Bagel?

Now we have clarity with a new sign and awning: Toasted Deli! (Exclamation point mine.) 

Anyway, haven't seen the place open just yet.

And before Toasted Deli: Yuba, the 9-year-old Japanese restaurant, closed here last summer as business dwindled during the pandemic.

Week in Grieview

Posts from this past week included ... (with a photo outside the recently reopened Nowhere on 14th Street)

• RIP Penny Rand (Wednesday) 

• Tenants: Pigeons have made empty apartment a health hazard in this Steve Croman-owned building on 7th Street (Tuesday) 

• You can own the shuttered Avenue A diner Odessa, now for sale on Craigslist (Friday) 

• Cinema Paradiso trying again with CB3 for Avenue A theater-cafe concept (Thursday) 

•  787 Coffee is opening a new location (and office) on 10th Street at 2nd Avenue (Wednesday) 

• Department of Buildings: 202 Avenue A does not have a "valid certificate of occupancy" (Tuesday) 

• Gaia Italian Cafe teases a return (Tuesday) 

• Think Coffee's brand-new curbside dining space catches fire on 4th Avenue (Thursday) 

• Uprooted tree in Tompkins Square Park (Friday) 

• Spiegel said to be returning to 1st Avenue (Wednesday) 

• Food Emporium has closed on Union Square (Monday) 

• Parks Department clears out the encampment from the Tompkins Square Park chess tables (Saturday) 

• Something to sing about: Planet Rose is reopening on Avenue A (Tuesday) 

• Rockwood Music Hall returns with live music (Thursday) 

• Gia signage arrives on the Bowery (Monday) 

• Marinara Pizza makes this corner of 10th Street and 2nd Avenue their own (Tuesday) 

• Stickett Inn bringing its cider to 1st Avenue (Thursday)

• Tony's Pizza debuts on 2nd Avenue (Thursday) 

• New alt.coffee concept vying for former Meatball Shop space on Stanton Street (Tuesday) 

... and yesterday, we're told that the 3CD Block Association planted flowers in the tree pits along Third Street between Avenue C and Avenue D ... said one resident: "An incredible effort on the part of people on the block."

H/T Bobby G!

---

Follow EVG on Instagram or Twitter for more frequent updates and pics.

No Charlie Parker Jazz Festival for Tompkins Square Park this summer

Back on Thursday, SummerStage announced its 2021 season lineup ... with reduced-capacity in-person events returning on June 17. (Ticket requests begin tomorrow at noon.) The shows include the annual Charlie Parker Jazz Festival on Aug. 28-29. 

However, unlike in past years, Tompkins Square Park will not be hosting the Sunday portion of the festival. Performances on both days will be in Harlem's Marcus Garvey Park/Richard Rodgers Amphitheater, where it will be easier to support SummerStage's 2021 social-distancing guidelines and ticketing process. 

--update--

The shows are FREE. You do need to request a ticket, though. As Gothamist and other media outlets reported, there are also some shows, all in Central Park, that will serve as a benefit where there is a cost for tickets, including George Clinton & Parliament-Funkadelic on June 27, Machine Gun Kelly on Sept. 13 and Indigo Girls & Ani Difranco on Sept. 21. This link has more info on the shows.

--

The festival started in Tompkins Square Park in 1993 ... taking place near or on Parker's birthday on Aug. 29. Additional dates were added in Harlem in 2000. 

Parker, who died in 1955 at age 34, lived at 151 Avenue B from 1950-1954. That residential building between Ninth Street and 10th Street is landmarked. 

Photo from 2019 by Steven

Saturday's parting shot

City officials meeting early today to make sure that no one sells zines, hosts a drag show or plays live music in Tompkins Square Park ...

[Updated] Parks Department clears out the encampment from the Tompkins Square Park chess tables

This morning, workers from the parks and sanitation departments brought up a truck and dismantled the encampment that had grown in recent weeks inside the chess tables area in Tompkins Square Park. 

Felton Davis shared these photos from just inside the entrance on Seventh Street and Avenue A...

Per Felton: "How much time did they give to people to grab their stuff and go? I'm not sure."

Meanwhile, the Parks Enforcement Patrol tossed the young adults from XR Youth who were getting ready to hold a flea market with art, clothing and zines... (thanks to Steven for the photo)

Apparently, you need a permit. And if you apply for one, they won't sign off on it anyway.

Updated 6/6 

People moved back into the area around the chess tables this morning ...

Photo by Steven...

EVG Etc.: Resident sues NYPD after 2020 deli shooting; Metrograph plots in-person return

• Cops in riot gear shut down Washington Square Park and Union Square last night at 10 to enforce new weekend curfew rules (@vanishingny ... Gothamist)

• Paralyzed East Village resident sues the NYPD after 2020 deli shooting (Daily News ... previously on EVG) 

• Kjun — a well-reviewed Korean-Cajun takeout and delivery operation — is moving in with Hi-Collar on Ninth Street (Eater) 

• Metrograph launches new TV app, announces September return to in-person screenings (Deadline) 

• Rivera vs. Hussein in District 2 Council race (City Limits) 

• Kate Goldwater, owner of the Seventh Street thrift boutique AuH20, details how she was able to maintain her business during the pandemic (CNBC ... previously on EVG) 

• The future of Governors Island (Gothamist) 

• An ode to Porchetta, the former specialty sandwich shop on Seventh Street (Salon) 

• When hippies took over Tompkins Square Park in June 1967 (Off the Grid) 

• A look back at East Village Other, which chronicled the counterculture movement (JSTOR Daily) 

• Because several people sent me this link: Former One Direction member Zayn Malik involved in a dispute outside Amsterdam Billiards Club on Fourth Avenue and 11th Street (TMZ) 

Photo last night from Tompkins Square Park

Speaking out against another power plant for Stuy Town-Peter Cooper Village

The Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village Tenants Association is holding a rally tomorrow (Sunday, June 6) at 10 a.m. to speak out against plans for another "polluting power plant" on the property. 

Per the invite: "We’re not the only ones affected: so will be anyone within at least half a mile of the plants. According to the city, we have some of the worst air, and environmental justice is a concern." 

The rally is on Avenue C between 15th Street and 16th Street. Several local elected officials are expected to attend. 

Details and background here via the Tenants Association:

In 2018, Beam Living announced they would be constructing a power plant fueled by natural gas purchased from Con Ed on the Main level between 245 and 271 Avenue C. The plant would produce steam for 24 buildings, and the electricity would go back to Con Ed to offset management’s costs. Renderings of the plant shown to the Tenants Association and to tenants depicted a smaller, less intrusive structure than the final version. The plant was almost complete in 2020 when Beam Living announced a second plant, this one to be constructed under the floor of Garage #1 on 20th Street. Any electricity produced would be sold back to Con Ed.

Dazed and confused

 

Getting ready to go out on the town with New Order from 1983... the video for "Confusion" was filmed in part at the Fun House on West 26th Street. 

(Thought of this in part because I saw that tix for New Order and the Pet Shop Boys went on sale today for the Garden in September 2022 — rescheduled from this past September.)

Details on Open Garden Day NYC and Art Around the Hood tomorrow

Some local community gardens will be taking part tomorrow (Saturday!) in the fourth annual Open Garden Day via GreenThumb... activities include garden tours, arts and music, yoga, gardening workshops, etc. 

You can visit the NYC Parks website here for details. In addition, 20 local community gardens are participating in Art around the Hood. Details at the LUNGS website. 

Highlighting one event over at the First Street Garden between First Avenue and Second Avenue... where there'll be a zine and plant swap ...

Top photo from the 6th & B Garden

Today in corned beef hash news

The corned beef hash is back on the menu at McSorley's, 15 E. Seventh St., for the first time since March 16, 2020. 

Photo and hashtag by @plannedalism

Uprooted tree in Tompkins Square Park

Ugh. One of the beautiful American elms honey locust trees came down in Tompkins Square Park last night over between the main lawn and the dog run ... William Klayer shared these photos...

Combination of winds, wet soil and rotten roots? (Anyone?)...

Updated... Here's a view from the dog run via Derek Berg...

You can own the shuttered Avenue A diner Odessa, now for sale on Craigslist

Odessa has been closed for nearly 11 months at 119 Avenue A between Seventh Street and St. Mark's Place.

Last July, longtime manager Dennis Vassilatos said that Odessa, which dates to the 1960s, was shutting down after a prolonged slump in business due to the pandemic.

However, closer to the last day, co-owner Steve Helios told Gothamist that Odessa was only closing temporarily, that the space would be renovated. (The building's landlord is Odessa partner Mike Skulikidis.) Few people bought this story, though. 

And for these last 11 months, Odessa has sat frozen in disco-fries time, without any noticeable activity inside.

However, an EVG reader (thanks, Bobby!) noticed that the diner was recently put up for sale on Craigslist... 

Per the ad:

Odessa Diner for Sale — Large Diner/Restaurant is a neighborhood staple for 44 years. Bustling business is located on a very busy street across from Tompkins Square Park and draws crowds with 24/7 service. It comprises over 2,000 SF on the ground level and 2,000 SF in the basement. Most of the business is walk-in with a significant possibility for growth by creating a large take-out business. Great casual and quick dining options for a densely populated area. Significant growth & expansion opportunities. 

Alternatively, it can easily be converted to other dining concepts with full bar. The location is ideal. Seats 100 in the restaurant and 9 at the counter. Kitchen is fully equipped and in excellent condition. Full basement with walk-in boxes and freezers. Full liquor license. Full breakfast, lunch, dinner and late-night menu. New lease will be given to buyer. The owner requires that buyers provide Proof of funds. First time offered. Great opportunity.

Asking price: $400,000.

Who's in?