Activity at the soon-to-be-condoed former synagogue on East 6th Street

We haven't noticed too much activity lately at the soon-to-be-condoed Congregation Mezritch Synagogue at 415 E. Sixth St.

However, yesterday, EVG reader Michael Hirsch spotted workers bringing in a load of rebar for the building between Avenue A and First Avenue...



"We are excited to be fully approved and beginning construction soon," Jody Kriss, principal and co-founder of East River Partners, told us via email.

As previously cut-n-pasted reported, the city approved the condo-conversion plans last December. Workers will renovate the building and add two floors.

The landmarked building was in disrepair and the congregation's population had dwindled. Synagogue leaders signed a 99-year lease with East River Partners worth some $1.2 million. The renovations include a penthouse addition and an elevator. The synagogue will reportedly retain space on the ground floor and basement for their use.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Plan to add condos to historic East Sixth Street synagogue back on

Play spot the potential penthouse atop the East Village synagogue

A final look inside the Anshei Meseritz synagogue on East Sixth Street

Stained-glass windows removed ahead of condo conversion at Congregation Mezritch Synagogue

Sarge's Deli celebrates its 50th anniversary today on 3rd Avenue

Just wanted to mention a favorite spot not too far away… Sarge's Deli on Third Avenue between East 36th Street and East 37th Street… the deli is celebrating its 50th anniversary with some all-day specials.

Sarge's reopened in March after a devastating fire put them out of business for 15 months. Amazingly, despite the renovations, the place retains its old deli charm.

95 Avenue A, home of Gin Palace, is apparently sinking

That's the word from owner Ravi DeRossi, who told Eater that the building that houses Cienfuegos, Amor y Amargo and Gin Palace is currently sinking into the ground.

To remedy the situation at 95 Avenue A (at East Sixth Street), Gin Palace will close after service this evening while crews address the structural issues. (The other two bars will somehow remain open.)

The Gin Palace Facebook page estimates they will be closed for two months.

Live at the Fillmore East, a commemorative plaque

Last Wednesday the former home of the Fillmore East, which helped launch some of the biggest names in music at Second Avenue and East Sixth Street from 1968-1971, received a commemorative plaque marking its place in history… and we just realized that we never posted the photo of the plaque. So…



And here is the whole ceremony, if you care to watch…



You can read more about the Fillmore East at the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, who, along with Two Boots, made the plaque possible.

And find a listing of every band who played the Fillmore East here.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Bank branch becomes bank branch at former site of the Fillmore East

The Loew's Commodore Theatre

Rock of ages: Commemorating the Fillmore East on 2nd Avenue

Express Tailor Repair living up to its name

Bill Cashman noticed this scene last night at the 55 Express Tailor Repair on Clinton between Stanton and Rivington... presumably a shirtless man sitting and waiting for his shirt to be expressed tailored...

Today's hawk

With a few pigeon feathers in his/her mouth in Tompkins Square Park...

Photo by Bobby Williams

[Updated] Rise of the robots on Avenue A

Someone has ordered a robot butler here on Avenue A and St. Mark's Place...



So many jokes, so few blog posts.

Photos via Derek Berg

Updated 12:27

Hmm, how many Robot Butlers arrived here today?

James and Karla Murray spotted this on East 14th Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue...

Zoltar in the morning

Isn't that cozy?

Word is that since Zoltar got moved to the left of Gem Spa on Second Avenue and St. Mark's Place, his business is off ... and he has more free time. Hence he's spending time out of the booth and in the reclining chair.

Out and About in the East Village

In this weekly feature, East Village-based photographer James Maher provides us with a quick snapshot of someone who lives and/or works in the East Village.



By James Maher

Name: Kim Kalesti
Occupation: Singer, Composer, Poet
Location: Avenue A, between 3rd and 4th
Time: 2 pm on Monday, Nov. 3

I was born in Pueblo, Colo., in the Rocky Mountains, and then I left when I was in high school. I came to New York in the early 1980s when I was in my early 20s. A friend visited me in another state and he was from New York and we ended up living together, getting married and having children together. My apartment was $70. I’m in the same apartment for 31 years.

I’m a composer, I’m a singer. I also write poems, do video poetry and write shows.

I was a professional when I was 5. My mother tells a story. She said we were in the park on a family picnic and there was a big band playing at the bandshell. I just came up to my mother and said, ‘I’m going to go sing with the band.’ She thought it was kind of funny. Then 10 minutes later I was onstage.

I came here and I had the pleasure of being blessed to sing with and to be influenced by all the great American composers and musicians in the jazz idiom. Earlier in my career, in the 1980s, I was singing with the greatest jazz musicians in the world … I was on the same stage with Joe Williams, Betty Carter, sang for Eartha Kitt, Abbey Lincoln, all of the majors who were around in those days. Lush Life was a club on Bleecker and Thompson Street on the corner. Everybody was around at that time. They were all the elderly masters of their generation. They were the creators of the music.

There were a lot more artists and a lot more creativity because it was affordable and so you would have these hubs of different types of artists. We were all working together, not separately. There were musicians and poets, performing artists and sculptors. You would gather and, because it wasn’t that expensive, you had a lot of time to be creative. You influenced each other. It was a wonderful time. It was dangerous here but at the same time it provided a hub of creativity. A lot of new ideas were born. People were writing their novels and opening up places and nurturing talent. There was just a lot going on in every genre of music and arts.

Now it’s kind of marketed like we’re supposed to be separate. That’s why I don’t really like to tell people what I do, because I don’t like to be pegged into one art form. Creativity expresses itself in a lot of different ways. I just recently recorded some choral work. I wrote some choral music and now I’m expanding my horizons. True artists, we’re a work in progress. There are artists who do make money. If you were never driven or had the opportunity — as they say, be in the right place at the right time, which they call luck — then artists have to devise a way to have their freedoms, and I’ve done that. We don’t shop, we don’t have credit cards, we don’t own things. That’s my system. I don’t own anything. I see the abundance and I live off the excessiveness of others and there are a lot of extra things.

I’ve been working on a project for nine years now. It’s called "Chemistry, the Living Museum." It’s based off my life experiences and my philosophy of living. I’m very connected with nature. I’m going to be performing this project soon. It has a whole choir, it has a band, dancers, aromatherapy and all kinds of things. Right now I’m putting together the group because the group not only has to play well but it also has to be in the right spiritual place.

James Maher is a fine art and studio photographer based in the East Village. Find his website here.

A few details on the 23-floor building replacing the soon-to-be demolished Bowlmor Lanes

[EVG photo from July]

News broke back in September that a 23-floor residential building will replace the former Bowlmor Lanes and other assorted business at 110 University Place between East 12th Street and East 13th Street.

According to DOB records, developer Billy Macklowe's new building will feature 107,965 square feet of residential space split between 52 apartments.

And now there's a few more details via the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation (GVSHP), who provided an update in its newsletter yesterday.

GVSHP had repeatedly reached out to Macklowe to urge him to build a contextual development at this site. Several local elected officials also recently met with Macklowe, including City Councilmember Rosie Mendez and Assemblymember Deborah Glick.

And the result?

[U]nfortunately the news is not good. Mr. Macklowe intends to move ahead with his planned 300+ ft. tall development at this site, which will take the form of a short base with retail uses coming out to the streetwall, and a very tall, narrow, residential tower rising above it. At approximately 308 feet in height, this will be one of the tallest, if not the tallest, buildings in the Village. Apparently Mr. Macklowe has told elected officials that the building will be limestone rather than glass or steel.

Per GVSHP:

This is extremely disappointing news, and sadly reflects the lack of landmark protections for much of the University Place corridor, and the current zoning, which allows towers of this size if a developer assembles a large enough site, as has been done in this case.

After 76 years in business at 110 University Place, Bowlmor Lanes closed for good this past July 7. The demolition permits were filed last Friday.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Building that houses Bowlmor Lanes will convert to condos, like everywhere else around here

76-year-old Bowlmor Lanes closes for good today

Bowlmor says goodbye

Bowlmor Lanes replacement: 23-floor residential building

118 E. 1st. St. will yield to a new 9-floor residential building

[Photo via Streeteasy]

Back in May, we pointed out that the 3-floor building at 118 E. First St. just off of Avenue A and East Houston was on the market for $5.15 million.

Among other things, the brokers were selling the space as either a development site with an additional 9,000 square feet of air-rights … or a "cash flow opportunity" with three apartments and a retail space.

Not surprisingly, the building's new owner has opted for the development site in the form of a 9-floor residential building.

Per New York Yimby, who first reported the news:

[A] developer operating under the name of Acacia 118, LLC – based in Nolita, and fronted by Cynthia Wu and Robert Marty – is planning to erect a new nine-story building, with seven much larger apartments.

As with many new projects in neighborhoods that once only supported rentals, 118 East 1st will likely be condos, with its seven units divided over 12,500 square feet of residential space. The average size is a quite hefty 1,800 square feet, with duplexes on the top and bottom and full-floor units in between, according to the building’s Schedule A filing.

As we've pointed out, 118 E. First St. was home some years ago to Darinka, the performance space that Gary Ray opened in 1983 (RIP — 1987). Darinka's many performers through the years included house band They Might Be Giants and cabaret nights hosted by Steve Buscemi and Mark Boone Junior.

Previously on EV Grieve:
118 E. 1st St. arrives on the market with so many possibilities, and air rights

A call to action from Miss Kita the Wonder Dog of East 10th Street

From the EVG inbox...

As is her way, Miss Kita the Wonder Dog of East 10th Street was recently browsing the headlines when she came across the following — "Dogs Now Banned From The Gate In Park Slope."

Because of the somewhat alarmist headline and the urgent nature of the subject matter, she pawed through to discover what is going down in Park Slope:

The Gate, on Fifth Avenue and Third Street, has welcomed dogs since it opened in 1997, but owner Bobby Gagnon says he's never run into trouble with the city over his pro-pups policy.

That changed last Tuesday night when a city inspector visited the bar to investigate a 311 complaint about dogs in the facility, Gagnon said. The inspector issued a fine for allowing animals into the bar for an unspecified dollar amount — Gagnon will find out how much at a Nov. 18 hearing.

The city's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

City law prohibits pet dogs in "food service establishments," but Gagnon argues that The Gate shouldn't be lumped into the same category as restaurants because it doesn't have a kitchen and doesn't serve food.

Miss Kita learned that supporters have created an online petition asking the city to revise the health code to reclassify bars that do not serve food ... making this more than just an issue in a Brooklyn neighborhood. (After all, several East Village bars have been welcoming to Miss Kita and her friends through the years.)

Miss Kita encourages her East Village neighbors to sign the petition on the Park Slope for Pets site here.

Meanwhile, Miss Kita has reached out to some Park Slope pooches directly to coalition build, consciousness raise, etc.

EVG note: Park Slope Stoop first reported on this ban.

Watch David Johansen interview Johnny Thunders outside CBGB circa 1976

Courtesy of a post at Dangerous Minds today, we have this impromptu video interview between now-former New York Dolls bandmates David Johansen and Johnny Thunders.

You can head over to Dangerous Minds for all the background… One thing: The interview was shot with photographer Bob Gruen's video camera and included on the New York Dolls DVD of Gruen footage, "Lookin’ Fine On Television."

I'm just waiting on the paint to dry

Workers are painting the landing at 96 St. Mick's Mark's Place ... a stoop made famous, in part (as well as this), by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards in the 1981 video by the Rolling Stones for "Waiting on a Friend."

EVG regular Bill the Libertarian Anarchist mentioned this ... and one of the workers said that the Stones would have to come back to do an updated version...



And might as well...



Previously on EV Grieve:
I'm not waiting on a lady...say, what the hell is Mick wearing anyway?