Tuesday, December 4, 2012

New deli on First Avenue looks like every other new deli

The deli on First Avenue near St. Mark's Place closed for a renovation (same owners) back on Oct. 22...


...and yesterday, workers unveiled the new sign...

[Bobby Williams]

Well, most new delis have this food court/regional airport terminal look these days... all selling panini, tossed salad, etc. Two quick examples...



Or maybe we need to say that they're better than [fill in the blank] a 7-Eleven...?

Previously on EV Grieve:
[Updated] Another East Village corner market closes; 13 and counting for the last year or so

Cafe Racer proposed for St. Mark's Place

Here's another quick look at an applicant on this month's CB3/SLA docket. Per CB3 documents, a group of applicants are seeking a beer-wine license for Cafe Racer at 127 St. Mark's Place near Avenue A. The cafe, serving panini sandwiches and salads, would have seven tables with proposed hours of 11 a.m. to midnight seven days a week.

Most recently, the address was home to the short-lived San Matteo Panuozzo, which never reopened after being "closed for renovations" in September. Previously, this address was home to Motek, the crepe place.

The committee meeting is Monday night at 6:30, JASA/Green Residence, 200 E. Fifth St. at the Bowery.

In case you needed a $14,950 sublet overlooking Union Square

You're in luck then with this two-bedroom home at 840 Broadway at East 13th Street that is available starting Feb. 1.

Per the Streeteasy listing:

What could be better than living downtown in a 2800' full floor corner loft steps away from Whole Foods, great shopping, fine restaurants and superior transportation? Imagine getting off the elevator and stepping directly into your dramatic new home with its sweeping New York City vistas including a view of Union Square Park, high ceilings and beautiful details throughout. Best of all, there is an updated modern kitchen for you to cook the wonderful fresh produce you've scored from the nearby Union Square farmers market ... You have the option of renting this special home with the owner's tasteful furnishings ... or you can bring your own.




Asking $14,950 a month.

Monday, December 3, 2012

The great Block Drugs on Second Avenue is currently without the services of its D


A cat encounter on East 10th Street


Photo by Bobby Williams.

[Updated] Day of Action: Cooper Union students lock themselves inside foundation building

[Via Facebook]





This letter explains the students' demands...

[Via @ChangeThruArt]

And via the EVG inbox...

One year ago, our current administration put tuition on the table for the first time in over 110 years. Students, alumni, and community members came together to organize, protest, and offer creative, viable, sustainable, solutions that avoided the implementation of tuition at our school.

One year later, undergraduate tuition is still on the table and the voting date is fast approaching. In response we are making a call to action! At 12 pm on Dec 3, 2012 join us at Cooper Union to let our administration know education is a right! We believe and are committed to the idea of free and sustainable education, not just for our institution but for all institutions!

12pm-6 pm: Join us outside the foundation building for a day of outdoors classes. Occupy Peter Cooper Park! ... We'll be picketing, handing out literature about student movements (including our own), making art, and making noise!

6-10 pm: Free and Open to the Public! Join us in Cooper's historic Great Hall for a public Community Summit on the state of higher education in NYC! Presentation on the current debt/tuition crisis, international student movements, and sustainable solutions. After presentations, speakers will sit on a panel for open question/answer segment.

Updated 3:54 p.m.:

The New York Times has more on the story here. Per Victoria Sobel, one of the students taking part in the lock-in, which started at noon in the Clocktower:

Soon afterward, she said, maintenance workers arrived and tried to force their way into the room.

“They were drilling and ramming the door,” she said. “It was very scary.”

The students pushed back, Ms. Sobel said, and yelled to the workers that their bodies were against the doors. After about 20 minutes, she said, the entry attempts ended.

Ms. Sobel said that the students had brought with them sleeping bags, blankets and food, including oatmeal and ramen noodles, and were planning to stay “as long as necessary” to get their message across to the administration.

Cooper Union officials said they were still formulating a response to the occupation of the Clocktower.

Is this the noise that you heard last night?


We heard from several readers last evening around 10-ish... asking what that mysterious buzzing noise was coming from somewhere around First Avenue and East Fourth Street... one reader figured the constant buzzing stopped around 11 p.m. or so.

The noise started up again this morning... and one reader found what he or she thinks is the culprit... leaf blowers coming from Village View...

A look at 6 new or restored East Village buildings


Just a quick photo update on projects that we've been following... Photos by Bobby Williams.

-----

New second floor for the Iglesia Pentecostal Sarepta
701 E. Sixth St.
More details here.


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Jupiter 21
21 E. First St.
More details here.


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Supportive housing for homeless young adults and young adults aging out of the foster-care system.
710 E. Ninth St.
More details here.


-----

St. Brigid's
Avenue B and East Eighth St.
More details here.


-----

51 Astor Place
More details here.


-----

84 Third Ave.
More details here.

Window washing at 51 Astor Place

Speaking of 51 Astor Place... we were watching someone with a handy-dandy extended window-washer thing the other day ...


... the yellow thingee...


And a quick video of the action... it's only an 11-second clip, but we could have watched for hours...

More details on Pride & Joy BBQ at the former Lucky Cheng's

Last Thursday, we noted that the first NYC outpost for renowed BBQ chef Myron Mixon was set to open at the former Lucky Cheng's space on First Avenue. (Read that post here.)

The group goes before the CB3/SLA licensing committee next Monday. And Pride & Joy officials have filed the necessary paperwork with CB3 (PDF), which provides a few more details on the venture (all just proposed):

• Hours: 11 a.m — 4 a.m. seven days a week
• 45 tables seating some 220 people
• 3 total bars in the space (one in the basement, one on First Avenue entrance and one in the East Second Street entrance where Bento Burger was)
• Approximately 30 employees
• Approximately 20 TV monitors

[Pride & Joy photo via Eater Miami]

Hope fades for a tidy tree house living room

Time to check in again on the tree house living room over here on First Avenue near East 14th Street ... An Urban Etiquette Sign recently appeared asking people to be respectful of the space and not leave trash around.

Flashback!


But the sign hasn't been effective.

And now? It's just getting uglier.


And someone even brought Bushwick into it!


Previously on EV Grieve:
Despite Urban Etiquette Sign, trash still piles up in tree house living room

Repaving East Houston

This past Friday morning, we had a conversation about the incoming bike lanes on East Houston... (read that post here).


Meantime, here's a great shot of the repaving from last week via EVG reader Eric Bryant ... looking east...

Sunday, December 2, 2012

A bike was stolen here yesterday afternoon on Avenue B


Avenue B between East Sixth Street and East Seventh Street...

Noted

Week in Grieview

[Spotted last week on Avenue C]

East Village Thai is back open (Monday)

Tim Hortons now open on East Houston (Saturday)

Q-and-A with Anonymous (Friday)

Natori closes on St. Mark's Place (Tuesday)

"The winningest man in barbecue" taking over the Lucky Cheng's space (Thursday)

Daniel Craig in the East Village (Friday)

Dream Baby (Tuesday)

LaVie closed for now on East First Street (Thursday)

Anger over the construction noise at 185 Avenue B (Monday)

Out and About with Michael Feeney (Wednesday)

A Daryl Hall moment (Wednesday)

Koffeecake Corner rumors! (Thursday)

Soho Billiards space for rent on East Houston (Tuesday)

Stogo closes (Monday)

A Black Friday improv gag at the First Avenue 99-cent store (Monday)

Report: Prop gun lands 11 year old in handcuffs, suspension

An item from the Post today:

An East Village 11-year-old was handcuffed and taken into custody last month after strolling into MS 345 on the Lower East Side with a play pistol — a black plastic prop given to him by an after-school theater company.

Violeta Hernandez, 68, said her grandson, whose name is being withheld by The Post, was supposed to be a cowboy in a play at the Theater for the New City in the East Village.

Instead, the pint-size actor was suspended and shipped off to an “alternative-learning facility” in Harlem for two weeks and is still traumatized by the ordeal, she said.

Police and school officials say that the gun was dangerous, and classified as an "air pistol." The family is considering legal action. Read the whole article here.

'Winter's Tale' filming today around Cooper Square; Russell Crowe alert

So this is filming today...


'Winter's Tale' ... described by IMDB as: "A fantasy story set in 19th Century and present-day Manhattan and revolves around a thief, a dying girl, and a flying white horse" by Academy Award-winning writer Akiva Goldsman...

There's a big cast that includes Russell Crowe, Will Smith, William Hurt, Jennifer Connelly, Colin Farrell, Eva Marie Saint and "Downton Abbey"'s Jessica Brown Findlay.... Not sure who will be filming around Cooper Union today...



Filming has also taken place in Sandy-ravaged Red Hook, where some residents have grumbled about the shoot delaying the clean-up process, per Page Six.

Noted

In case you need to use the men's room in Tompkins Square Park...


Saturday, December 1, 2012

Outbreak


10th Street between Avenue B and Avenue C today... photo via Bobby Williams...

Hello! Is it me you're looking for?


H/t Lionel Ritchie, duh. Photo in Tompkins Square Park by Bobby Williams.

Noted


Tompkins Square Park...

What's with all the cabs parked on Avenue A?

That's what a reader asked yesterday after seeing cabs lined up on Avenue A the past few days... EVG regular Creature noted this too with the following three photos...




[From Thursday via Bobby Williams]

I didn't see all this myself... and really have no idea. Anyone know?

Updated: Thanks. Answer in the comments.

NOW it feels like the holidays with the arrival of Trailer Park Santa

Oh, we knew something was missing from the holiday tree stand on East 14th Street at East First Street... the trailer just seemed so... bare.


Yes. Of course! Trailer Park Santa! He arrived this past week


Suitably grubby for this intersection.


So hang your stockings and say your prayers,
'Cause Trailer Park Santa Claus comes tonight.

Noted

East 10th Street and Fourth Avenue...




Friday, November 30, 2012

A scene from the L train platform


Photo by Bobby Williams.

Purple reign



They Might Be Giants with "Purple Toupee" from 1988.

Previously on EV Grieve:
On the phone with John Linnell of They Might Be Giants

'The future is unironed'


Photo from this afternoon on East Seventh Street and Avenue A... headline courtesy of Shawn Chittle via Facebook.

Relief supply giveaway tomorrow at Dry Dock Park

From the EV Grieve inbox...


American Red Cross contributes 50,000 new coats, scarves, boots and more in unprecedented partnership with churches and faith-based groups.

Who: Abounding Grace Ministries, Trinity Grace Church, Somebody Cares America, New York City Christian Resource Center, and American Red Cross

What: Pop-Up Relief Site Winter Clothes Giveaway

When: Saturday, December 1, 9 am - 5 pm while supplies last

Where: Dry Dock Park at Avenue D and 10th Street

Lower East Side churches and volunteers will distribute 5,000 coats, scarves, boots and other winter supplies at Dry Dock Park on Saturday, December 1, in the shadow of the power plant that darkened lower Manhattan during Super Storm Sandy. The only Manhattan location is one of eleven regional hubs created by a unique partnership between American Red Cross, Somebody Cares America, New York Christian Resource Center, and local faith-based groups that collectively will distribute 50,000 coats and more this weekend to communities most directly impacted by the storm.

On Friday afternoon the American Red Cross shipment will arrive in a 53’ tractor trailer which volunteers will unload, sort and prepare for distribution on Saturday. Dry Dock Park will open to the public on December 1 at 9am, and will remain open as long as supplies last. Recipients must be present at the park to receive supplies.

For more information about how and where to volunteer, and what happened in the days immediately following the storm, visit the ministries’ shared blog.

Prepping Adler for Wylie Dufresne


As you might have heard, noted LES chef Wylie Dufresne (of wd~50 on Clinton Street) is opening a place at the former Plum Pizzeria at 157 Second Avenue. As Grub Street first noted, the place will be called Adler, and serve "modern casual food and well-crafted cocktails."

Today, as you can see in the photo, workers continue to de-Plum Pizzeria the exterior...

This car blocked the Second Avenue bike lane for most of the morning

This morning, EVG reader John sent along a photo of a bike-lane obstruction on Second Avenue just below East 10th Street...


Two hours later, the car was still there...


The owner of the car has something apparently to do with the construction job at 154 Second Ave.