Avenue A's new Black Market

Missed this yesterday at Gothamist:

The former Pizza Shop next to Niagra on Avenue A will be called Black Market.

Black market?

Keeping with the Clash theme perhaps?



Previously on EV Grieve:
Report: Former Pizza Shop becoming a bar

EV Grieve Etc: Mourning Edition

LES neighbors let the SLA have it (The Lo-Down)

No progress at Chumley's (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Rat tails in Tompkins Square Park (Neither More Nor Less)

TSP at dusk (Greenwich Village Daily Photo)

Curbed checks in on the million dollar condos at 32 Clinton (at Stanton). Says the broker: "We have a lot of West Villagers coming over here because this area is now what that was 15 years ago. The West Village is too chic. This area is raw and gritty, and the young creative crowd want that."

That sketchy Blimpie/pizza/sushi place on Park Row was shuttered by the DOH again



Why is the newish Chase branch in FiDi built to look like a Jersey diner?



Snoop Dog and Storm Trooper at the SoHo Adidas (Racked)

Snooki is always watching (BuzzFeed)

Big Blue condo for sale (BoweryBoogie)

Can't wait to read this on my Kindle!* Via (lordy) GaGaDaily:

The rumors are true: Overlook Press is publishing the first biography of the world’s favorite pop star. The press release says:

“In Lady Gaga: Behind the Fame biographer Emily Herbert introduces 23 year old Stefani Germanotta. A Catholic school girl turned go-go dancer, Gaga rose out of the Lower East Side club scene to reign supreme in the pop world.

“An inspiring story as well as commentary on today’s celebrity and fame-obsessed culture, Lady Gaga: Behind the Fame is a well-researched, intimate look into the music, fashion, art, and life of the first Lady of pop.”

* Not true. Just seeing if I could bait Jeremiah....

Your Day of Ray flier

Anyway, here's the Day of Ray Flier designed by Jennifer Schindelar... You should be able to print one out.... And as Leah Milstein, who helped put all this together, noted: "PLEASE DON'T POST ON CITY PROPERTY BECAUSE WE GET FINED!! (this includes lamp posts, parking meters, your neighbors dog)."

Yes. I know this from experience. Like $300.





As always...

www.twitter.com/saverays

And there's the Save Ray's Facebook page...

Neighborhood gears up for Day of Ray tomorrow

So many people are coming together to help with saving Ray's Candy Store on Avenue A near Seventh Street... last night, we saw a lot of chalk signs on the sidewalk for tomorrow afternoon's big event...





As Chris Flash said in a comment on the Day of Ray, "This is an example of community organizing at its finest."

Indeed. Lilly O'Donnell and Haley Moss Dillon, who both grew up in the East Village, have helped put this benefit together. I asked Haley about her earliest Ray's memory. "Kindergarden -- on my way from the neighborhood school on 3rd street to the playground in Tompkins, my mother bought me and my friend a giant milkshake."

And what does Ray's mean to her and the neighborhood? "Ray is old school New York. He's open all the time. It's a weird little place that everyone feels connected to, that's what New York used to be about, that's what New York felt like when i was growing up, the anonymity of the neighborhood now is destroying what used to be a thriving community."

Get the Day of Ray lineup at Sidewalk Cafe here.

For further reading:
Ray pays rent, faces fries fight; Benefit on tap (The Villager)

And, if you're new to this, go to Neither More Nore Less and type in Ray's Candy Store in the search up top... Bob Arihood has been been taking photos and reporting on Ray from Day 1...

And, you know, there's a Save Ray's Twitter feed, which will have the latest updates...

www.twitter.com/saverays

And there's the Save Ray's Facebook page...

Giant rats invading one of the nicest blocks in the East Village?

Here, on the tree-lined East 10th Street between Second Avenue and Third Avenue (oh, yes — as seen below in this photo from the summer...where Parker Posey once lived!)



...Anyway, right in the heart of the St. Mark's Historic District -- evil lurks... in the form of some bigass rats, apparently... just check out these traps...




...hope the neighborhood doesn't have a problem with stray cats too...

MARS BAR was a riot in the Nineties...

An EV Grieve reader pointed out the Facebook page titled "MARS BAR was a riot in the Nineties..." Since then, I have been looking at the nearly 800-plus photos there, such as these by Ellen Cheever....





(And thanks to Ellen for granting me permission to repost here...)

And this!

Now let's get in line for some Frrrozen Hot Chocolate at Serendipity 3!

I don't make it up to this part of town all that often so...in case this has already been covered elsewhere... spotted this over by Park Avenue South and 33rd Street earlier this week...



...and if you stand at this spot and look toward the west... you can almost see where Rick's Cabaret is on 33rd Street...

What happened to Boutiques on Bowery?

Something called Boutiques on Bowery was scheduled to open Feb. 1 at the retail space in 52E4, the 15 stories of condo on the Bowery near Fourth Street...




And, as Goggla and others have noted, not much is going on in this space...looks awfully empty...





...and the "for rent" signs are gone...

East Village bar roundup: An issue with Professor Thom's liquor license and Superdive's Mad Dog Room

Lots of EV-related bar news....

A follow-up on the Professor Thom's post from the other day. Eater has the news:

"They'll be closed down until Feb. 22. Turns out they forgot to renew their liquor license with the SLA in time..."

And also via Eater — as well as NY Barfly — comes word that Superdive is having some sort of issue ... Per Eater:

A quick search reveals they've been hit with a violation for working on the place without a permit and allowing people to gather without a certificate of occupancy. Since the building's ground floor certificate is still legal (PDF), one can assume the DOH is referring to the bar's newish basement space, called the Mad Dog Room.

Meanwhile, I will continue to ignore those e-mails about a Superdive Dead Pool ....

Hugh gotta be kidding? Thespians battle for Bowery-Bond bachelor pad

According to the Post's Jennifer Gould Keil today:

Hugh Grant and Gerard Butler might be duking it out for the $15.45 million penthouse triplex at 54 Bond St. in NoHo. Both actors have checked out this grand, three-bedroom, 4,862-square-foot bachelor pad on a charming cobblestoned block. Developer Adam Gordon says the entire building is also for sale at $32 million — and can be turned into an 11,000-square-foot, single-family mansion (plus retail space), with the basement used for storage or transformed into a lap pool. Gordon bought the cast-iron, landmarked structure, which dates back to 1874 and is also known as the Bouwerie Lane Theatre building, for $15 million in 2007.

The penthouse has swirling mahogany staircases where a craftsman molded each piece of wood by hand. There are two full gourmet, dine-in kitchens — one with an adjacent wine-tasting room. The penthouse also includes 1,277 square feet of outdoor space, including a roof deck and a terrace.

If one of these fellows should happen to land here... they would join this group of notables who have lived at this address... (per the 54 Bond Web site)



Previously on EV Grieve:
Looking at the "new intersection of cool"

Moonstruck Diner closed for a variety of reasons

EV Grieve regular Goggla noted last night that the Moonstruck Diner on Second Avenue at Fifth Street was closed... As she said:

A sign on the door says they have plumbing problems, but a DOH sign says there will be a court hearing to decide whether or not they'll re-open, which is odd...the kitchen windows have been papered, so you can't see what's going on in there, but it looks like someone is doing some work.

Indeed, we walked by ourselves and saw the following...






Previously on EV Grieve:
Neighbors call for a boycott of the Moonstruck Diner

Sad news about the liquor store on Houston and Avenue B

I walked by the liquor store at Houston and Avenue B last night... and once again, the place was closed...



...and I noticed that the liquor sign on the side had been removed...



My worse fears were confirmed when I got home and read the latest issue of The Villager... in an item about Chico's new mural here, Scoopy reported that the woman who owned the liquor store died several months ago... and in the space on the roll-down gate, Chico is going to paint a mural of the owner. (And does anyone know her name?)



I have no idea what will happen to this space. I haven't seen the store open in some time, though this isn't really a corrider that I walk with any frequency.... Me being me, I worry about what will become of the space. This is prime corner real estate with million dollar condos right across the street (like this one for $1,825 million).

And I'll miss the owner... the kind of which we don't see much of anymore...

Previously on EV Grieve:
Meanwhile, right around the corner

As for Chico's new mural...

In his column this week, Scoopy had the following news about the new mural CHico is creating on Houston and Avenue B. To the Scoopster:

It turns out Chico, who is back in town from Tampa for some more commission work, is painting over the P.O.P. [Power of Peace] mural with a new one for a local band, Loisaida. He’ll then paint a new one for the Girls Club just to the west, covering over another of his murals, for the local band Aventura. Basically, it’s not what we thought — that someone might have dared diss Chico by painting over his work — but just some mural switching by the artist himself.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Chico has a new work in progress on Houston and Avenue B

A vintage TV ad for Christopher Street Bookstore

Jeremiah's post yesterday on adult bookstores reminded me of this vintage commercial that I found for Christopher Street Bookstore... I think this first ran during Super Bowl XX...