We used up the last of our mulch puns last year

Sure, you have about 18 to 24 weeks of life left in your Christmas/holiday tree, but if you just have to dump the damn thing so early, then head over to Tompkins Square Park … where there is a tree depository in the middle of the Park ahead of MulchFest.

MulchFest 2015 takes place on Saturday and Sunday, Jan. 10-11 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

And we'll be selling VIP wristbands for $500 that get you:
• Commemorative VIP party laminate
• MulchFest gift bag with exclusive merchandise
• Specially designed MulchFest tour apparel item
• Early entry into the venue before general doors
• Crowd free merchandise shopping
• Designated VIP check-in

The Sweet Generation awning arrives

The awning arrived yesterday here at 130 First Ave. near St. Mark's Place, where the custom bakery is set to open early in the New Year.

As we first reported last month, this is the first storefront for owner Amy Chasan, a former high school arts teacher who quit her job to open the made-to-order cookie and cupcake business.

Here's more about the place:

Sweet Generation not only funds Arts education for youth, but engages young people in the business itself. A portion of Sweet Generation’s sales are donated to Arts organizations, and we support their fundraising efforts through in-kind donations of our baked goods. We also started an internship program that teaches baking, work readiness, and entrepreneurship to teens and young adults from low-income communities.

In 2013, the Voice named Sweet Generation the "Best Cupcake" in NYC.

After 30 years here, proprietor Wieslawa Kurowycky and her family decided to retire and close First Avenue Pierogi and Deli in early July.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Coming soon to 1st Avenue: Sweet Generation, 'A Bakery for Arts Education'

Sidewalk fire on East 6th Street

A small fire broke out earlier this evening on the sidewalk next to Walter De Maria's former home-studio at 421 E. Sixth St. between Avenue A and First Avenue... @chewbaklava shared this photo with us... a neighbor coming out of his apartment saw someone light a bunch of cardboard boxes and run off... no word on any damage here...

[Updated] High rents KO the 2nd Ave. Smoke Shop & News

The 2nd Ave. Smoke Shop & News has closed… EVG contributor Derek Berg spotted workers clearing out the deli/bongwater-pipe shop here on Second Avenue near East Fifth Street…



Word is the smoke shop rent doubled to $10,000. A for rent sign has been hanging on the space for months now.

Updated: 2:13 p.m.

Ah! Matt Rosen in the comments tells us that the shop is moving down Second Avenue … to the east side past East Fourth Street where Gelato Ti Amo recently closed … we even had photo evidence of this from last night via Slum Goddess…

Report: Police searching for suspect in East 6th Street sexual assault

[Image via NBC New York]

The NYPD is looking for a man accused of sexually assaulting a 22-year-old woman inside an East Sixth Street apartment building early yesterday morning.

According to NBC New York, the man allegedly followed the woman into the building at about 6 a.m. and sexually assaulted her in the stairwell. The victim was treated for minor injuries at Beth Israel.

NBC New York's report described the suspect this way: approximately 25 years old and 180 pounds with short cut hair. He was last seen wearing a dark baseball cap, black bubble jacket, blue jeans and black sneakers. (The NBC report also does not list the building address or cross streets.)

Anyone with information that could help in the investigation is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477). You may also submit tips online.

Updated 9:18 p.m.

WABC has an interview with the victim here.

Fight continues to save the Church of the Nativity

[Outside Church of the Nativity]

As previously reported, the Church of the Nativity on Second Avenue between East Second Street and East Third Street is on Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan's closure list as the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York undergoes a massive reorganization. (Under the plan, the church would merge with Most Holy Redeemer on East Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.)

Meanwhile, some of the church's parishioners continue to do what they can to keep the church open. (They have created a Facebook page, a Twitter account and a YouTube channel.)

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that "at least 18 parishes are now seeking recourse with the Vatican to overturn or limit the scope of the imminent merger."

And the Church of the Nativity is among the parishes at various stages of the appeals process.

Last Tuesday, two parishioners visited the Archdiocese of New York to read Nativity's decree letter, the official document that states the reasons they want to close the church. According to the Keep Nativity Open Tumblr, the reasons given are a change in demographic and a decline in priests.

Per Keep Nativity Open:

We have been speaking with canon lawyers and according to canon law, a decline in parishioners and decline in priests are not valid reasons to close a church. We are seeking recourse with the Vatican.

The Archdiocese cannot sell our building within a two-year period

We are fighting the merger, and the closing of Nativity. If we do merge with Most Holy Redeemer, Nativity’s parishioners need to stay united because we might have a chance to keep the building from being sold in two years. (The Archdiocese can’t sell the building for another two years). If Nativity’s parishioners are separated and divided, the Archdiocese can easily sell our building. But if we are united, we may have a chance to save Nativity when that time comes.

As for a timeline on all this. Back to the Journal:

An appeals process can take years, according to canon lawyers and church advocates around the U.S. The process, they say, is a complicated, highly technical one, following a strict timeline and involving several benchmarks set by canon law, the regulations set by the Catholic Church.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Parishioners fight to save the Church of the Nativity on 2nd Avenue

Reminders: The 41st Annual New Year's Day Marathon Reading

[Photo from Jan. 1, 2014 by Ted Roeder via]

The Poetry Project's annual marathon reading is set to start Thursday at 2 p.m. at the St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery.

Some 140 writers, musicians, dancers and artists will be involved this year.

Here is a list of who is expected to take part:

Adam Fitzgerald, Adeena Karasick, Alan Felsenthal, Alan Gilbert, Alex Cuff, Ali Power, Alli Warren, Andrew Durbin, Anne Waldman w/ Fast Speaking Music, Anselm Berrigan, Ariel Goldberg, Arlo Quint, Avram Fefer, Beth Gill, Bill Kushner, Billy Cancel, Bob Rosenthal, Brandon Brown, Brendan Lorber, Bruce Andrews & Sally Silvers, CAConrad, Callers, Charity Coleman, Charles Bernstein, Christine Kelly, Cliff Fyman, Cori Kresge, Dan Owen, Danniel Schoonebeek, David Berrigan, David Henderson, David Vogen, Dia Felix, Diana Rickard, Don Yorty, Dorothy Friedman August, Dorthea Lasky, Douglas Rothchild, E. Tracy Grinnell, Ed Friedman, Edgar Oliver, Edmund Berrigan, Eileen Myles, Elinor Nauen, Elizabeth Willis, Erica Hunt & Marty Ehrlich, erica kaufman & Matt Longabucco & Nicole Eisenman, Ernie Brooks, Peter Zummo & Bill Ruyle with Walter Baker & Billy Fica, Evan Kennedy, Farnoosh Fathi, Filip Marinovich, Foamola, Georgia Faust, Gina Myers, Grey Vild, Ian Spencer Bell, Janet Hamill & Lost Ceilings, Jason Hwang, JD Samson, Jennifer Bartlett, Jess Fiorini, Jim Behrle, Joanna Koetze, Joel Lewis, John Coletti, John Giorno, John Kruth, John Priest, John S. Hall, Jonas Mekas, Joseph Keckler, Karen Weiser, Karinne Keithley Syers, Katy Bohinc, Katy Lederer, Kiely Sweatt, Kim Rosenfield, Kristin Prevallet, Laura Henriksen, Lee Ann Brown, Lenny Kaye, luciana achugar, Marcella Durand, Maria Acconci, Mariana Ruiz Firmat, Martha King, Maryam Parhizkar, Matthew Shipp, Mel Elberg, Michael Veal, Mike DeCapite, Miriam Atkin, Monica de la Torre, Morgan Parker, Morgan Vo, Nat Otting, Nick Hallett, Nicole Peyrafitte, Nicole Wallace, Niv Acosta, Norman MacAfee, Patricia Spears Jones, Penny Arcade, Peter Bogart Johnson, Philip Glass, Pierre Joris, R. Erica Doyle, Rachel Levitsky & Susan Bee, Rachel Tractenburg, Ray Brown, Rob Fitterman, Samita Sinha, Sara Jane Stoner, Simon Pettet, Simone White, Siobhan Burke, Steve Dalachinsky, Steve Earle, Steven Taylor, Tammy Faye Starlite with Steve Earle, Ted Dodson, Thom Donovan, Thomas Sayer Ellis & James Brandon Lewis, Todd Colby, Tom Savage, Tommy Pico, Tony Towle, Tonya Foster, Tracey McTague, Ursula Eagly, Vito Acconci, Will Edmiston, Xena Semjonova, Yoshiko Chuma, Yuko Otomo, Yvonne Meier and others TBA.

You can buy advance tickets for $20 each here. All proceeds benefit the continued existence of the Poetry Project.

You can not spin the Keith Haring sculpture at 51 Astor Place

Workers have removed the barriers around the Keith Haring sculpture that sits in the public plaza at 51 Astor Place.

Several people have pointed out that it looks as the sculpture is on some type of turntable-swivel-something base…. meaning you could give it a spin. Maybe to make up for the temporarily displaced cube at Astor Place.



Anyway, after doing some field testing, the sculpture does not rotate.



So people will have to come up with different ways to interact with it.

The circa-1989 sculpture, titled "Self Portrait," arrived here on Dec. 2

The 1 remaining piece of the Salvation Army's former East Village Residence on the Bowery

Workers have torn down the Salvation Army's former East Village Residence on the Bowery at East Third Street … but one piece of the structure at 347 Bowery remains… as we spotted through the handy blogger portals on the plywood…



Perhaps the developers of the incoming 13-floor, 30,000 square-foot mixed-use residential building are keeping this detail for some authenticity? (Heh.)

New building construction eats up Avenue A sidewalk

Last Tuesday, workers added more plywood/fencing to 98-100 Avenue A … extending the wood to the curb… and putting pedestrians in a makeshift walkway here between East Sixth Street and East Seventh Street…





There are approved permits on file with the city for developer Ben Shaoul's incoming 6-story retail-residential building.


[Photo by Bobby Williams]

Previously

A memorial for the man killed by a tire swing in Tompkins Square Park

[Photo by Bobby Williams]

There is a small memorial in Tompkins Square Park for Harlem resident Aleim Perkins. According to published reports, he was playing with his 6-year-old niece in the playground off East Ninth Street and Avenue A on Dec. 15. Witnesses have said he was aggressively pushing an empty tire swing when it struck him in the face. He was rushed to Beth Israel, where hospital officials said he was dead on arrival.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Witness to a tragedy in Tompkins Square Park

Week in Grieview

[Photo from Christmas Day by Derek Berg]

A look at Matcha Cafe Wabi, now open on East Fourth Street (Friday)

Video: "11 Minutes of Hell" on the Lower East Side (Wednesday, 54 comments)

Demolishing the last two East Village gas stations (Monday)

DF Mavens arrives (Tuesday)

Checker's opens on First Avenue (Monday)

The number of chain stores increased this past year in NYC, though not in the East Village (Tuesday)

Back Forty abruptly closes (Tuesday)

Remembering Joe Strummer on the anniversary of his death (Monday)

A really good sunrise (Saturday)

Sleepy's coming to Third Avenue (Monday)

Another holiday season with Jonathan, the cheery Christmas-tree salesman of First Avenue (Tuesday)

The gut renovation of 137 Avenue C (Tuesday)

$13 billion hedge fund latest 51 Astor Place tenant (Tuesday)

Shakespeare & Company ultimately got kicked out for a Foot Locker (Wednesday)

McSorley's does not have the oldest liquor license in the East Village (Friday)

The Year Without a Trailer Park Santa Claus (Friday)

EVG turns 7 (Wednesday)

… and a dog in a bag at East Village Cheese…


[Photo by Derek Berg]

A 1980s 'Night Walk' in downtown NYC

[Screengrab from the "Night Watch" trailer]

The Times has a feature today on Ken Schles, who spent part of the 1980s living and taking photographs in the East Village.

He now has a follow-up to his 1988 book "Invisible City" titled "Night Walk."

Here's a description of the book:

Schles revisits his archive and fashions a narrative of lost youth: a delirious, peripatetic walk in the evening air of an irretrievable downtown New York as he saw and experienced it. Night Walk is a substantive, intimate chronicle of New York's last pre-Internet bohemian outpost, a stream of consciousness portrayal that peels back layers of petulance and squalor to find the frisson and striving of a life lived amongst the rubble.

Here's a trailer for the book...



Schles, who now lives in Fort Greene, "rejected the recent tendency to view the East Village of the 1980s as a golden age of louche glamour," according to the Times. "A lot of dysfunction has been romanticized," he said.

The book "is dedicated to the memory of those who died in the scourge of AIDS and violence that gripped the East Village during the 1980s."

Today's hawk posing

Top two photos via Bobby Williams... and via EVG reader BaHa...

And now, the waxing crescent moon

Local astronomy buff Felton Davis had his gear set up earlier on Second Avenue and East Third Street ... here's a shot of the waxing crescent moon via Brian Van ...

X marks the spot above 1st Avenue

Or maybe a belated xmas message? Photo this afternoon via Grant Shaffer

Can't wait for this open house on St. Mark's Place!

Spotted the other day at 128 St. Mark's Place…

Things people were talking about on East 2nd Street this morning

A few people were wondering what happened to this car between Avenue A and First Avenue...

This morning's spectacular sunrise

The view from East Second Street… Photo by Caz Lulu via Facebook…

There's 1 more free concert this year in Tompkins Square Park

This afternoon...

Still crazy like a Fox...

Television is playing Sunday night at Irving Plaza... ahead of that, here's "Foxhole" from 1978...

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning Edition

[Photo earlier this week on East 2nd Street by Bill Buchen]

A crime of passion from the 19th century that played out on East 13th Street and Avenue A (Ephemeral New York)

More details about DF Mavens, opening today on Second Avenue and St. Mark's Place (DNAinfo)

The Manhattan Borough President's Office now accepting applications for Community Board membership (DNAinfo)

Still time to see Art & Ephemera from 98 Bowery, 1969-89 (The Lodge Gallery)

Update on the new Dirt Candy on Allen Street (Eater)

The end of Cafe Edison (Jeremiah's Vanishing New York)

Please do not push your sofa out a 6th-floor window (BoweryBoogie)

… Animals, the Wayland's sandwich shop on Avenue C and East Ninth Street, has started local delivery — Monday-Friday from Noon-6 p.m.



… and noted…

overheard in an #eastvillage cafe, "and by tinkerbell i mean cocaine."

— jdx (@jdx) December 24, 2014

Pumpkins — not just for Halloween anymore

They also make for decorative additions to street lights, like seen here on Second Avenue and East Ninth Street … photo via John Coakley.

Matcha Cafe Wabi now open on East 4th Street

Matcha Cafe Wabi recently opened at 233 E. Fourth St. near Avenue B.

The cafe's owners offered up a sneak preview for neighbors back in October. EVG contributor Stacie Joy stopped by for a look ... and taste. Here's her report:

The open house was for the neighborhood to introduce them to the matcha and sencha tea drinks, the red-bean paste and green tea pastries (gluten free!), matcha tea lattes, and the Japanese roasted coffee drinks.

I tried the classic pour-over coffees from 95 RPM Coffee Roasters (co-owned by Hiroki Kobayashi and Osamu Igano), which I drank as suggested — straight up without milk or sugar. I also tried the soybean black-sesame drink, which thankfully had no caffeine and was sweet and delicious — and unusual to my admittedly uneducated palate.

Kimie Kobaya (pictured below), the shop’s enthusiastic and friendly manager, brought around trays of samples to the guests and patiently translated between the English-speaking and Japanese-speaking visitors.



We learned about Wabi-Sabi, the aesthetic of imperfection, which was a difficult concept to translate from Japanese. (Kimie suggested the Wikipedia page definition.) We enjoyed a (truncated) tea ceremony, courtesy of Yuji (pictured below), who showed us the usu-cha-style bamboo whisks used to blend the bitter green tea powder into tea, and how the bowls are prewarmed, and about the bubbles that mimic a lake and shore in the tea bowl.



The owners of the new shop are Hideaki Minamida and Ken Mitsui, who you might recognize from Pirka Salon next door. (Both shops share the address 233 E. Fourth St.) The tiny to-go spot’s green-tea colored walls and minimalist décor mimic the healthy and happy feelings you experience when ingesting the drinks.

What East Village bar has the oldest liquor license?

[Photo by James and Karla Murray]

OK, the photo gives it away, of course.

Anyway, some interesting research via I Quant NY, who examined the data on New York State's open data website.

A few things from the post:

The oldest recorded NYC license in the dataset belongs to the Harmonie Club on E 60th St in the Upper East Side, though you have to be a member to enjoy a drink there. It dates to 1933. The oldest beer license is for Nathan’s Famous in Coney Island, which dates back to 1934. And the oldest liquor store license is from 1941, and it belongs to North End Wine and Liquor in the Bronx.

And in the East Village, the oldest license belongs to Vazac's/7B/Horseshoe Bar, which dates to 1948.

But what about, say, McSorley's?

Per I Quant NY:

Note that this does not mean these are in fact the oldest bars or restaurants, but rather the oldest with a single continuous liquor license and a proper start date on record.

McSorley's has changed hands a few times, he explains, the last being in 1977, when the state issued a new license.

'Dear Lord' — A Christmas song from Suicide

The fine folks over at Dangerous Minds posted about a Christmas song by one of our favorite bands, the misanthropy* duo Suicide.

Here are details per Dangerous Minds:

In 1981, the great no-wave label ZE Records — home to the eardrum-hurty likes of Lydia Lunch and Arto Lindsay — decided that the label would release A Christmas Record, a compilation of original Christmas music by its deeply underground artists. It seems, and was, pretty ridiculous, but that album yielded an actual enduring holiday season classic in the Waitresses’ “Christmas Wrapping.” Other artists who contributed were Material with Nona Hendryx, Cristina, and Was (Not Was). It was and remains deeply regrettable that Lydia Lunch contributed no Christmas song, but there was one by the equally malevolent Suicide, and another by that band’s singer Alan Vega.

Head over to Dangerous Minds for more, including the Vega track...

* misanthropy is Dangerous Mind's description. We like that.

The Year Without a Trailer Park Santa Claus

[Another holiday season]

Well, as you may have noticed, grubby ol' St. Nick never arrived this year at the tree stand on East 14th Street and First Avenue…

Instead, we were treated to some lame perky inflatables …



Waited until later to pass this along so as not to ruin the holiday.

Anyway, time to toss the tree and pick up your Easter Candy at Kmart…

Christmas Eve, Tompkins Square Park

Photos by EVG reader Mr. Baggs...

Christmas Eve, Astor Place

Jerry Delakas at Jerry's Newsstand, site of one of the more positive neighborhood stories this year.

Photo by Kelly King

Holiday movies: 'Blast of Silence'

Reposting this repost this from Dec. 23, 2011…

I know that I've written about "Blast of Silence," Alan Baron's New York (slightly hokey) indie noir from 1961.

Will repeat some of it now... the movie is about a contract killer in New York for a job during the Dec. 25 holiday season ... well, the trailer will tell you what you need to know...



Of interest hereabouts... the main character, "Baby Boy" Frankie Bono, stays at the Valencia on St. Mark's Place... which is the St. Mark's Hotel today, of course...

[Via]

In the background, you can see the former Saint Marks Russian and Turkish Baths ... which became the New St. Marks Baths ... and, eventually, Mondo Kim's ... and now the NYC Tofu House…