The annual NYC Fetish Marathon kicked off last night in the basement lounge of One and One with a “Beat & Greet” thrown by fIXE Magazine. “We are the new mainstream,” said Cary Monotreme, the impresario of the fetish-pinup photo mag. “There’s a nut commercial with a dominatrix in it. I don’t know how much more mainstream you can get.”
Indeed, the atmosphere was one of a convivial dinner party thrown by old friends – that is, if one could mentally adjust to the revealing PVC gear sported by nearly all attendees and the occasional bound-up transvestite getting worked over on a giant X-cross. Once in a while, a band of vanillas inadvertently stumbled downstairs and got scared off, but their squeamishness was unwarranted, according to top-hatted longtime scenester Dale Whysper. “If you talk to the bouncers,” he boasted, “they’ll say, ‘We have fewer problems at your parties.’” Read more…
Add Parkside Lounge to the long list of neighborhood mainstays that are soliciting donations to keep afloat. The East Houston Street bar seeks $10,000 to overhaul its performance space to include a new bar and better sound equipment. “With all the stuff that’s going on in the neighborhood right now, sometimes I get nervous. Some places have just completely changed their identities. I don’t want to do that,” operating partner Christopher Lee says in the video, filmed by the local fundraising company Lucky Ant.
The longstanding bar serves up cheap booze and an eclectic array of musical acts, much like Lakeside Lounge did before it shuttered at the end of April. Read more…
Restaurant-construction voyeurs may have noticed a couple of new developments: the plywood that has long obscured Nicoletta, Michael White’s forthcoming pizzeria on the corner of Second Avenue and East 10th Street, came down yesterday. Today, a banquette was awaiting installation; a representative for the restaurant said it’s aiming to open in the next two weeks, pending Department of Buildings inspections and liquor license approval. “The chef wants to get in and make sure he gets to do some work as well,” said the rep.
Daniel MaurerGin Palace
And over at Gin Palace, the forthcoming cocktail lounge from Ravi DeRossi of Death & Co., Mayahuel, the Bourgeois Pig, and Cienfuegos, antique-style lighting has just been installed over the mural that David Nordine is working on. A worker on the scene told The Local that the Victorian gin joint is aiming to open June 11.
Maybe, just maybe you noticed last night that yet another bonkers illuminated sign has joined the flashy Mediterranean Grill and Tapas signage on First Avenue? If not, do watch the color-changing magic in our video above. It’s enough to give the light show at Smokin’ Tattoos a run for its money.
The Turkish takeout joint opens its next-door tapas lounge at sundown tonight, and your first wine is on the house.
Late last night, while Chinese-Ecuadorian chef Carlos Chusan helped decorate the narrow dining room with Turkish and Moroccan trinkets, he told The Local he planned to serve “a little bit of everything for everybody, because the Lower East Side is American, Chinese, Polish, German – so there’s a little bit of everything.” As you can see below, the pan-Mediterranean menu includes nods to Mexico (quesadillas) and Ecuador (ceviche).
The 40-seat tapas lounge will be open from about 5 p.m. till as late as 2 a.m. on weekends. Care to see the menu?
DNA Info attended the historical plaque ceremony at Justus Schwab’s former saloon on East First Street. The Greenwich Village Society for Historical Preservation, along with Phil Hartman of Two Boots, plan to install similar plaques at least once a year, and Mr. Hartman is hoping to commemorate the former home of Andy Warhol’s Exploding Plastic Inevitable at 19-25 St. Mark’s Place.
Speaking of Andy, The Times reviews “Jukebox Jackie,” based on the life of Warhol superstar Jackie Curtis. Charles Isherwood says that at times the new production at La MaMa “comes close to mimicking the foggy ramblings of someone on an intense trip,” but Justin Bond “most naturally embodies the Curtis who bloomed briefly before drug addiction felled him at the age of 38.”
The folks at the Lower East Side Preservation Initiative tell us that on Sunday at 1 p.m., theater historian Cezar Del Valle will lead a tour of the East Village’s Yiddish theater district, once known as the “Jewish Rialto.” As part of the tour, an architect involved in the restoration of Village East Cinema will talk about the theater that opened in 1926 as The Yiddish Art Theater. Tickets are $15 in advance and $20 on Sunday, and can be reserved here. Read more…
At 23, Jessie Mac is one of New York’s youngest curators. Tonight at 9 p.m., her third show at Gathering of the Tribes, “’93 Til Infinity,” closes with a party featuring a screening of “Captured,” the 2008 documentary about photographer, curator, and local historian Clayton Patterson. The exhibition features Mr. Patterson’s early-90s photos of the Lower East Side amid floor-to-ceiling graffiti work by Mint&Serf of the Peter Pan Posse art collective. Ms. Mac spoke with The Local about working with Steve Cannon, the founder of Tribes who is fighting to hold onto the space.
Q.
How did you wind up as curator of Tribes?
A.
I started working at Tribes a year ago as an intern when I met Steve Cannon. We cut a deal: if he taught me to curate I would dedicate my time to Tribes. It’s a non-profit so Steve is always in need of an extra hand. I never thought a blind man would be my artistic mentor, but I honestly would not be a curator without him. He taught me everything I know in the New York art scene. When people ask how he feels about not knowing what’s on the walls in his own space he says I’m his eyes. But I would have no direction without him. Read more…
It costs a pretty penny to throw down with the East Village’s elite.
A swank benefit for the United Jewish Appeal of New York on June 6 will be co-chaired by Benjamin Shaoul, who owns numerous properties all over the neighborhood, and will feature a performance by another local: John Legend. Questlove of the Roots will also spin records.
Tickets for the gala at Capitale on Bowery start at $360, and go as high as $20,000 for the “Legend package” that includes a meet-and-greet with the piano-playing crooner, as well as a listing on a “Scroll of Honor as ‘Legend.'” Lesser donations yield designations as a “producer,” “promoter,” or “performer,” among others. Read more…
The above photo was taken during “casserole night” yesterday, part of what organizers hope will be an ongoing international movement to show solidarity for students protesting tuition hikes in Quebec. According to a reporter for The Local, over 100 protesters made their way from Washington Square Park to Union Square and then uptown, some of them banging pots and pans as they headed up Broadway.
Crain’s reports that the Jehovah’s Witness Hall that was such a headache for Nublu is now on the market. “The 3,050-square-foot, two-story property located at 67 Avenue C, at 5th Street, is up for grabs, according to Robert Knakal, chairman of Massey Knakal Realty Services, which was retained to market the building on behalf of the Witnesses.”
The Post reports that one of the men accused of attaching skimming devices to ATMs in Astor Place and Union Square has been sentenced to three years in prison. His brother and alleged accomplice remains at large. Read more…
The Appellate Division of State Supreme Court has affirmed the city’s decision to evict the longtime operator of a newsstand at Astor Place — though a strongly-worded dissenting opinion has given the Greek immigrant a glimmer of hope.
The latest blow to Jerry Delakas’s livelihood comes as the result of an arrangement made in 1987 with his friend, Katherine Ashley. Ms. Ashley was the owner of the license for the newsstand, and Mr. Delakas paid her $75 a week to work there. When Ms. Ashley died in 2006, she wrote in her will that Mr. Delakas should inherit the license. It subsequently passed to other family members while Mr. Delakas continued to operate the stand. Last year, the Department of Consumer Affairs refused to let Ms. Ashley’s estate and then Mr. Delakas renew the license on the grounds that the deal was illegal.
The appellate division of the State Supreme Court concurred with that argument in a ruling filed late last month. Mr. Delakas “had to be aware of the illicit, under the table arrangement he facilitated by his payments to three separate owners beginning as far back as 1987,” reads the ruling, which is below. Read more…
We last called upon Kim Davis, the East Villager who writes At the Sign of the Pink Pig, to judge the new porchetta sandwich at Il Buco Alimentari e Vineria against the classic version at Porchetta. Now that another buzzy sandwich shop has opened in NoHo, we asked him to referee another meat match. Will the Canadian underdog, Mile End, prevail over the reigning champion, Katz’s?
Kim DavisThe smoked meat sandwich at Mile End.
The East Village, like it or not, may be gentrifying, but one might have been forgiven for thinking that some things would never change. The supremacy, for example, of the pastrami sandwich at Katz’s as an iconic New York dish, a plated symbol of deli history, and the one thing any visitor to the neighborhood has to eat.
Yet here comes Canadian Noah Bernamoff, with a trimmed down version of his modernist Brooklyn deli Mile End, opening on Bond Street just off the Bowery, no more than a ten-minute walk from the self-proclaimed “Best Deli in New York.” Read more…
The police are searching for a man who allegedly robbed the HSBC at Second Avenue and East Ninth Street around 45 minutes ago.
An officer at the scene provided The Local with a surveillance image of the suspect, who is seen wearing a black cap and a long-sleeved white shirt. The investigation had just gotten underway, but the police officer said that the suspect passed a note demanding cash, did not show a weapon, and escaped with under $200.
A tipster notes that renovations are underway at 98 Avenue B, the future home of the Alphabet City mainstay Gruppo, which has served thin crust pies for the last 11 years. Last week Community Board 3 voted in favor of the transfer of Gruppo’s beer and wine license, provided it agree to several pro forma stipulations related to quality-of-life concerns. An employee said that the restaurant would open in its new location sometime this summer.
Mark Nickelsburg, a longtime East Village resident, will debut “Harry Grows Up” tonight at the inaugural New York International Short Film Festival at Sunshine Cinema. The 12-minute film is about a toddler, Harry (played by Mr. Nickelsburg’s son Lucas) who loses his babysitter (Elizabeth Elkins) when she heads off to college. The tot sinks into the kind of deep depression that results in empty baby bottles strewn about the house, leading narrator Josh Hamilton to quip, “I’m not the first heartbroken New Yorker to turn to the bottle.” But then along comes Zoey, a love interest closer to Harry’s age. Mr. Nickelsburg, 41, described the short as a “romantic comedy for adults, starring babies.” The Local spoke with him about filming his own son in the streets of the East Village.
Q.
One of the major characters in your film is the East Village. Was that intentional?
A.
Yes. The experiences that Harry is going through and some of the locations that he’s going to I drew from my own experiences. Like the storefront that figures prominently in the movie, that was around the corner from where I used to live. Moonstruck is the diner on Fifth and Second where Harry drowns his sorrows. I went there all the time. Read more…
Stephen Rex BrownCook Nicola De Mori behind some of the meats at Porchetta.Hog.
Porchetta may no longer be hogging the spotlight where herbed roast pork sandwiches are concerned. First there was the $16 porchetta sandwich at Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria, and now a new contender by the name of “Porchetta.Hog” has entered the swineosphere.
The takeout spot opened earlier this month at 309 East Fifth Street, just a few blocks away from Porchetta, and it too is serving $10 porchetta sandwiches, as well as $8 hamburgers and a handful of other dishes (the full menu is below). Read more…
First, the good news: Just a week after its paint job, Calliope has opened in the former Belcourt space. Grub Street has a look inside, and you can find the menu at Menupages.
Now, the bad. A couple blocks up on Second Avenue, Vandaag has become the latest ex-Villager. Thursday morning, The Local spotted a sign on the window of the darkened Dutch restaurant indicating that it was closed due to plumbing problems. Today, a new sign regretfully informs patrons of a “recent decision to close Vandaag.” The note concludes, “Fortunately, we were able to move most of our team to new digs, in Brooklyn,” meaning Woodland in Park Slope.
Vandaag opened in the former Bounce Deuce space at Second Avenue and Sixth Street and garnered two stars from The Times and then another favorable review from The Local (“Perhaps Vandaag, too, will disappear before long,” worried James Traub back in November of 2010. “I hope not; it’s the only Dutch-Danish restaurant in the neighborhood.”) Unfortunately, it was under-performing even before it lost its chef back in August.
Anyone know where to go now for a nice shot of aquavit?
For every East Village business that’s opening or closing, dozens are quietly making it. Here’s one of them: Pageant Print Shop.
Lauren Carol SmithRebecca Solomon
It’s been nearly two decades since Michael Caine and Barbara Hershey perused the Pageant Book Shop for a copy of E. E. Cummings in “Hannah and her Sisters,” but the store’s history goes back farther than that. In 1946, Sidney B. Solomon and Henry “Chip” Chafetz joined the ranks of Book Row, a stretch of mom-and-pop bookshops along Fourth Avenue from St. Marks Place to 14th Street. One of Mr. Solomon’s two daughters, Shirley, took over after her father died and then moved the store to West Houston Street after a rent hike in the 1990s.
Pageant became an online-only enterprise in 1999, only to reopen at 69 East Fourth Street after Shirley’s sister Rebecca moved back to the city. Nearly seven years later, the siblings are still selling hard-to-find items, though now maps and prints rather than rare books. “Some are old, some are very old, some are very, very old,” said Shirley during a recent conversation with The Local.
Q.
How does a shop that sells old maps stay in business?
A.
Shirley: I focus on the unique and affordable. I have things from $1 to $100, to $1,000. There’s an original David Roberts lithograph that is $3,000 framed. We get lots of foot traffic and sell a lot of things in the $1 to $4 range, which adds up. Read more…
Introducing a new column written by those who loved the East Village and left it. Today: Rachel Trobman tells us why she crossed the bridge to Brooklyn.
Rachel Trobman in her 13th Street apartment, 2005.
Williamsburg is teeming with babies. That was my first reaction to my new neighborhood. I’d been lured from the East Village after seven years there by the increased space, a price that would allow me to buy, and the likelihood there would not be a man singing opera at 3 a.m. outside of my window.
Moving across the river, I knew I could expect a slightly longer commute, no yellow cabs, less college students, more facial hair.
What I didn’t see coming was the prevalence of young children. There were five pregnant women in my building when I moved in. Now there are five infants and several toddlers. There are babies in the restaurants, strollers in the parks and tiny humans in the subway.
I first moved to the East Village, from the West Village, when I graduated New York University. My sister, and roommate, was a sophomore there and wanted to be close to campus. I didn’t want to be too far from Chelsea and the news network where I had just gotten a job. We found a reasonably priced “two bedroom” walk-up on St. Marks Place – more like a one bedroom made out of a living room, with a second bedroom made out of a closet. Read more…
Hermann the German isn’t the only pizza-parlor painter in the neighborhood. After doing the wall of The Bean’s forthcoming location (with an assist from Mosaic Man), Walker Fee scored a gig across the street. This past weekend, we spotted the muralist painting the facade of East Village Pizza. The owners, we were told, wanted to bring balance to the block. And apparently, Mr. Fee will bring still another mural to the block after this one.
Meanwhile, a block away on St. Marks Place, there’s a newish mural of “Mister Shoetree” on the side of Foot Gear Plus. The artist, Robert Gardner (a.k.a. Robare), brought it to our attention in the comments of our “Making It” interview with shopkeeper Linda Scifo-Young.
When we first brought word of Alphabet City Beer Co. in December, it was an empty storefront. Last Thursday, the bar-and-beer-shop hybrid opened its doors and its taps. Helmed by David Hitchner (co-owner of In Vino, Alphabet City Wine Co.) and Zach Mack (a writer who has worked at tech start-ups) it’ll serve far-east guzzlers and gourmands who don’t feel like schlepping over to Good Beer to refill their growlers. In addition to coolers stocked with takeout bottles and cans from around the world, there’s a bar serving about a dozen beers on draft (expect the recently launched Alphabet City Brewing Co. to make appearances) and a grocery section carrying cured meats and cheeses picked out by Martin Johnson, an East Villager who writes the Joy of Cheese blog and also knows a thing or two about jazz.
The new shop expects to host beer tastings on a weekly basis. Sixpoint Brewery recently visited, and Louisiana’s Abita Brewery will follow up with an event next week. Watch The Local’s video for a look inside.
You’ve met the the DJ, the musician, the drag queen, and the bar manager. Now, to conclude this week’s series, meet Agnes Wtaszczuk, the overnight waitress and floor manager who hosts the nightly after-after-party at (where else?) Veselka.
The Local was a journalistic collaboration designed to reflect the richness of the East Village, report on its issues and concerns, give voice to its people and create a space for our neighbors to tell stories about themselves. It was operated by the students and faculty of the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University, in collaboration with The New York Times, which provides supervision to ensure that the blog remains impartial, reporting-based, thorough and rooted in Times standards. Read more »
Chris O. Cook The Baroness and entourage.
