Breaking: Construction starts in the Mystery Lot

[In dramatic voiceover, maybe a little James Earl Jones like]: It has begun.

Photo via EVG reader Jodi.

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Mystery Lot likely facing a luxurious end

The last days of the Mystery Lot

Breaking: The Mystery Lot likely facing a luxurious end

Oh no!

The Real Deal is reporting this afternoon that developer Charles Blaichman has purchased the long-vacant Mystery Lot on East 14th Street for $33.2 million. Among other projects, Blaichman teamed with Jay-Z for a boutique hotel/development deal near the High Line that eventually imploded.

Excuse us: We need a minute to compose ourselves.

Previous Mystery Lot coverage here.

Ode to the Mystery Lot

An inspired (and anonymous) reader sent this along...

O Mystery Lot!

Home to dead bodies
But also morning glories

Used by some as a dumpster
But also bore a fabulous monster

Full of contradiction
Don't let us lose you to construction!

Think you can do better? We'd like to hear it. Or at least read it. In the comments... or via gmail...

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Mystery Lot likely facing a luxurious end

Breaking: Workers enter the Mystery Lot; fate of Monster unknown

@TheDevo alerts us to some people inside the Mystery Lot this morning looking at the fallen monster.

Trouble in paradise?

Likely not! These photos by Adam K suggest that the workers are merely Mowing the Mystery Lot...

We hope that they're only mowing, anyway...

The Mystery Lot gates are open!

A reader walking along the 13th Street side of the Mystery Lot last night noticed that the gates were open... and the gates remain open this morning... now is your chance to go inside one last time, maybe ...

Unverified reader tip: A fight broke out in the street and spilled into the Mystery Lot last evening. Any readers know what happened here...? (Please let us know via the EV Grieve email.)

The East Houston Street Mystery Lot is now for sale

Wanted to mention this news... we've long been curious about the Mystery Lot of East Houston Street ... the empty parcel on the south side of the street between Attorney and Ridge ... The Lo-Down had the scoop on Wednesday...

The lot is now on the market for $9.5 million ... it's part of the portfolio that belonged to reclusive real-estate baron William Gottlieb ...

The lot has been empty for seemingly eons ... According to the Lo-Down, Gottlieb acquired the property via public auction in 1999 for $300,000.

The mind reels with thoughts of what will show up here some day...

Mystery masonry garden wall coming down at the Mystery Lot

While we wait for something significant to happen at the Mystery Lot ... we did notice a new permit from the city last week approving work for "removal of masonry garden wall." (Estimated Total Cost: $10,000.)

We're not quite sure what garden wall this is...

Short of hopping the fence, which we'd never do ... we can only guess at this moment... Photos from the weekend...

We even called in the EV Grieve satellite for an aerial shot...

Anyway, at the DOB website, there are permits pending approval related to building over this lot of bricks and mystery. The plans for the building were disapproved the first time on April 20.

As the Post first reported on Jan. 19, the space will become an 82-unit, eight-story development that should break ground this summer for a late 2013 opening. The work permits say that the space will include 86,409 square feet for residential and 5,275 square feet for retail.

Previously.

[Updated] This feature should get a 'Rise' out of you

We interrupt our regular programming to bring you highlights from today's cover story in the Post's Home section titled "Rise in the East" (heh)

... and they have details on some of these stalled developments, empty parcels and mystery lots that we've been watching though the years ...

Should we start with the bad news or the worse news?

Basically, there's a lot of building here on the horizon. Like!

• The Mystery Lot on 13th Street between Second Avenue and Third Avenue.
This space will become an 82-unit, eight-story development, which should break ground this summer for a late 2013 opening. "Prices are still to be determined for the project’s studio and one-, two- and three-bedroom units," according to the Post.

[Pause]

The article also mentions the developments coming to 74-84 Third Ave. (part of which once belonged to Nevada Smith's) and 316-318 E. Third St., which is awaiting demolition to become an eight story, 33-unit apartment building. Developer David Amirian told the Post that he will offer only studios and one bedroom units.

"The market right now is to build rental. You want to build affordable housing for young people," he said.

Here are photos of the two from the Post.

Hmm, 74-84 Third Ave. looks particularly... ENORMOUS. (I will miss the sun while walking by here.)

A few other passages:

• "[The East Village is] young and up-and-coming, and there are a lot of young professionals who live there and a lot of students and a lot of grad students," Amirian says. "We are definitely looking for other parcels in the neighborhood."

Up-and-coming? Don't you think those days have up and came? Or something.

• Of course, some of the East Village’s rental buildings could eventually go condo. The idea of $2,000-per-square-foot penthouses has to have developers considering the possibility.

Of course!

More on some of the other news items here later when I regain consciousness.

As the Observer put it in their coverage of the Post feature:

In short, the former bastions of East Village grit are giving way to rental buildings where parents will pay for their NYU student to live comfortably and drink heavily.

Before it was the Mystery Lot

Wednesday afternoon, The Real Deal reported that developer Charles Blaichman bought the long-vacant Mystery Lot on East 14th Street for $33.2 million.

Seems like a good time to repost an earlier item about the lot's former tenant — The Jefferson Theater. Per Cinema Treasures:

The old Jefferson Theatre opened in 1913 as a B.F. Keith’s vaudeville theater in what is now known as the edge of the East Village. Later the RKO Jefferson, this theater was located at 214 E. 14th Street near Third Avenue. The entrance was a narrow space between two tenement houses with the bulk of the theatre (auditorium) located in 13th Street. The Jefferson operated at least into the 1970’s and was demolished in 2000. Today, the site is filled with bricks and debris from the demolition and the old Jefferson as passed on.

And a few photos of the theater through the years...

[Undated photo by tkmonaghan via Cinema Treasures]

[Undated photo via]

[From 1986. By kencmcintyre via Cinema Treasures]

[Top two photos via Warren G. Harris via Cinema Treasures]

[April 2011 from 13th Street]

Jeremiah has a good bit of Jefferson history here.

A bad sign at the Mystery Lot?

For nearly three years, our favorite empty lot probably anywhere (dubbed the Mystery Lot by Curbed) on 13th and 14th Street off Third Avenue included an ad for EmigrantDirect.com. (Awesome one-off buy!)



Now, in recent weeks, we just noticed that the ad has been removed...



Does this finally mean a dreaded "for sale" sign will appear?

Please no!

Previously.

Blue tarp down! [Repeat] Blue tarp down!

Tuesday at the Mystery Lot!



Now!






At least now we'll all be able to enjoy the new tags... As a reader noted the other day:

The tarp was down (still there, but down) this morning.

I'm not sure it means anything. A year or two ago a plastic fence was put up behind the chain-link fence. It was eventually taken down and as far as I can tell nothing had happened.

I like that lot. It looks just awful when they put stuff up to block the view.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Mystery lot singing the blues?

East Village stories to watch in 2013 (Part 1)

• The reopening of St. Brigid's on Avenue B

[From October]

The restoration/renovation of the historic Avenue B church is winding down after several years... last we heard from a St. Brigid's watcher, the church is expected to reopen in the first few months of this year... and we can't wait to see the inside... Bonus question: Will neighbors ever get used to the bells?

-----

• Filling in the Mystery Lot

Ah, our old friend the Mystery Lot...

[Some time ago]

...will soon look like this on East 14th Street/13th Street east of Third Avenue...

-----

• The end (and new beginning) of Astor Place

Workers are quickly erecting the 430,000-square-foot office complex at 51 Astor Place ... which will shape up this year to look like...



Building aside, the city is also expected to dramatically reconfigure streets, parks and traffic islands around Astor Place and Cooper Union ... leaving us with that Midtown feeling...

-----

• 84 Third Ave. grows taller

We learned last month that the Karl Fischer-designed building rising at 84 Third Avenue at East 12th Street will be 12 stories, not nine as originally expected. Of any of the area's new development, this just may look like the most out-of-place project. And that's saying something.

-----

• A dorm for 35 Cooper Square

The former 35 Cooper Square was demolished 18 months ago here at East Sixth Street. Perhaps soon in the New Year we will learn more about developer Arun Bhatia's plans for a 9-story dorm, which are currently on file with the DOB.

-----

• Something for 100 Avenue A

[A scene outside 100 Avenue A yesterday by Bobby Williams]

Not much seems to be happening at 100 Avenue A, where East Village Farms closed in February 2012. The city disapproved the first round of plans to renovate the space, including adding a "dwelling unit" and roof garden on the upper floors.

The sidewalk outside the storefront has mostly been used to accommodate some people in need of a place to sleep this past year.

However, in one small bit of progress, the DOB did approve the foundation work here back on Nov. 9, per city records. Will we finally see work start on the renovations in 2013?

-----

• Development for the former Mary Help of Christians school, church and lot

Staying on Avenue A ... the saga of the Mary Help of Christians Catholic Church enters its fifth year... The Catholic Archdiocese sold the church property, which includes the Don Bosco Salesians rectory adjacent to the church and the church's former school on East 11th Street, for a reported $41 million. Douglas Steiner, owner of the Brooklyn Navy Yard's Steiner Studios, is the new owner, and he has plans for in the works for an 80/20 residential development.

...and this promises to be an enormous development ...

[Via Off the Grid]

Will the church be demolished to make way for the new housing? (The Landmarks Preservation Commission has already turned down requests to landmark the circa-1917 church.) Or will at least part of the church be incorporated into the design of the new building, much like NYU did by sort of including the façade of St. Ann's into the entrance of the 12th Street dorm?

Meanwhile, nothing will likely happen with the new development until workers have shored up the eastern wall at the East Side Community School on East 12th Street.

Tomorrow: East Village stories to watch in 2013 (Part 2)

Revisiting: East 13th Street and 'Taxi Driver'

[226 E. 13th St. last week]

We've had several thousand posts of late about the Mystery Lot ... as well as on 222 E. 13th St., the long-abandoned building between Third Avenue and Second Avenue that will become the Bea Arthur Residence ... providing housing for up to 18 homeless LGBT youth.

During all that, a few people brought up the pivotal role this stretch of 13th Street played in "Taxi Driver." Well, all that has been well-covered before... but it does seem like a good time to quickly revisit the 1976 film.

Plenty has been written about the locations for the movie, most notably Scouting New York, who meticulously created now and thens for a post in October 2009.

A sampling just from East 13th Street...

Here's Iris and Travis traveling east on the street (The Jefferson Theater is on the left, where the Mystery Lot is now)...

...and Iris and Travis entering 226, where she took her clients ...

Scouting New York has a lot more on the locations here, including now-and-then photos from this neighborhood. Off the Grid has more on the East 13th Street locations here.

And here's Sport and Travis...