Lyn Pentecost, Executive Director of The Lower Eastside Girls Club, came across what some fashion lovers might consider the ultimate Craigslist find: 50 never-worn vintage wedding gowns, each with its original price tag. Looking to purchase one or two last fall, Ms. Pentecost contacted the seller (a lawyer representing the estate of a wealthy woman) who told her it was an all-or-nothing deal— 50 dresses for $2,500. She declined at first, only to hear back from the lawyer a few months later with an offer of $500 for the entire lot.

Within weeks, two boxes arrived on her doorstep stuffed with mint-condition gowns—garments that a group of teenage girls have since ripped, cut, and spray painted, putting an individual, modern twist on fifties style. Read more…

Christina Jean Chambers A scene from “Ambrosia” by Kelley Nicole Girod.

A pair of upcoming plays at the Red Room aim to turn notions of “black theater” upside down.

“Ambrosia” (about an elderly southern woman deciding to die happy) and “Breakfast” (about a middle-class black family dealing with a gay son) will run as a double feature starting August 10.

Both playwrights said that they sought to avoid the clichés of their genre. Read more…

Michelle Rick

Good morning, East Village.

The Post reports that singer Gavin DeGraw was attacked by a group of men on First Avenue between Fifth and Sixth Streets around 4 a.m. Monday. He was scheduled for a concert in Saratoga Springs today, but instead Mr. DeGraw, who owns The National Underground with his brother Joey, is under observation at Bellevue Hospital.

The “outlook is dim” for the last of the lighting businesses along the Bowery. “Store owners point to gentrification, the downturn in the local housing market and the rise of online shopping as having taken a toll on their businesses,” writes The Wall Street Journal.

More change on the Bowery: The folks at Bowery Boogie and The Lo-Down recap last night’s CB3/SLA meeting. According to The Lo-Down, a “slightly more affordable” version of midtown steakhouse Quality Meats has been green-lighted for liquor at 199 Bowery. Bowery Boogie reports that the owners of Peels at 325 Bowery were given the nod for some alterations.

Correction: August 12, 2011

An earlier version of this blog post misstated the name of a neighborhood blog. It is The Lo-Down, not The Lo-Side.

Khristopher J. Brooks Francesca Manisco and her favorite filing system

Today on The Local East Village, it’s all about cleaning house. First Brendan Bernhard recounted the epic task of clearing out his apartment after it was infested by bed bugs. Now a professional organizer (yes, they exist) tells how to avoid all that clutter in the first place.

For nearly a decade, Francesca Manisco was a radio and television producer for Italian broadcast programs. An avid cook, she also contributed a chapter on regional Italian food to “All Italy: The Book of Everything Italian.” She moved to New York in 1980 and found her true calling a little over a decade ago after reading a story in the New York Daily News about professional organizers. Ms. Manisco says she was fascinated to learn that she could “get paid to nag people on where to put their things.”

These days Ms. Manisco works out of her East Village apartment on East 4th Street, a one-bedroom unit that holds thousands of books and hundreds of CDs, but is still quite tidy. A dozen mugs hang from hooks that are screwed underneath her kitchen cabinets; her books are stacked two rows deep; her art supplies are tucked into a canvas box in a corner; and she keep documents in an antique secretary desk.

The Local sat down with Ms. Manisco to gather a few tips on organizing, including how to get more space in a studio apartment. Read more…

Stephen Rex Brown Tommy McKean says that the whir of the air conditioning units directly above his apartment is a constant nuisance.

This time of year, the whir of an air conditioning unit is usually reassuring. But for several tenants living at East 13th Street and First Avenue, two industrial-strength air conditioning units on the roof of their building are instead a constant torment.

“It’s like a helicopter hovering overhead all day,” said Tommy McKean, who lives directly below the units on the fifth floor of the building. “For ten minutes, it’s not so bad. But for 24 hours a day it’s awful.” Read more…

One of the two police officers who was acquitted of raping an intoxicated East Village woman in 2009 has been sentenced to one year in jail for official misconduct, the Daily News reports. The officer, Kenneth Moreno, 43 was immediately taken away in handcuffs to begin serving his sentence as his accuser looked on. A jury found Mr. Moreno not guilty of rape in May, but did find him and his partner, Franklin Mata, guilty of misconduct for entering the woman’s apartment without permission. Mr. Mata is expected to be sentenced later today as well.
Update: The sentencing of Mr. Mara has been postponed until Wednesday because his lawyer could not be present, the Daily News reports.

Scott Lynch

Good morning, East Village.

East Village cyclists have been put on notice. City workers plan to discard several abandoned bikes near East First Street between Avenue A and First Avenue, according to a Department of Transportation sign spotted by EV Grieve. Better pick yours up by the end of the day.

The New York Daily News profiled former CBGB bartender Jane Danger, owner of Jane’s Sweet Buns. The shop, at 102 St. Marks Place, features baked goods with hints of alcohol, like a Rum Runner bun with nutmeg, cinnamon, raisins, brown sugar, Galliano liqueur and aged rum.

Finally, Neither More Nor Less, Marty After Dark, EV Grieve, and Gothamist have photos from Saturday’s protest against East Village gentrification. Activist John Penley and his crew started at East Third Street, found its way to the BMW Guggenheim Lab and ended at what used to be Mars Bar. A poem was read. A cigarette was lit. Signs were waved, and then the protestors went home.

Meghan Keneally Jimmy McMillan is facing eviction from his rent stabilized apartment on St. Mark’s Place, though when working, he spends much of his time in his car.

This morning, The New York Post reported that the city’s most memorable gubernatorial also-ran, Jimmy McMillan, says he is facing eviction because, according to his landlord, his St. Marks apartment is not his main residence (it’s said he works largely in Brooklyn, where the headquarters of The Rent is Too Damn High party are also located.) Mr. McMillan has reportedly lived in the East Village apartment since 1977, but when The Local contacted him (perhaps he, too, would share some of his favorite brunch spots?), he didn’t seem eager to show off his East Village bona fides.

“As an independent undercover investigator, I need to be careful about my family’s safety,” Mr. McMillan said. “I will not give out information about my rent or location. I have a constitutional right to privacy and I will not tell you or anyone where I slept last night or where I am going to sleep tonight.” Read more…

Meghan Keneally The new restaurant will be at 78-84 Rivington Street, located on the corner of Rivington and Allen Streets.

The owner of Frank, Supper, and Lil’ Frankies, along with a business partner, are opening a new Italian restaurant called Sauce on the corner of Allen and Rivington Streets in early October. In addition to a dining room, the space will feature a grocery section as well as a demonstration kitchen that will host cooking lessons.

Last year, Frank Prisinzano, who runs three restaurants in the East Village, and Rob DeFlorio applied to open a fourth restaurant on Second Street and Avenue A. Citing the high number of restaurants in the area and the noise levels, the community board resolved not to support their application for a liquor license.

“They were right,” Mr. DeFlorio said about the decision. “We got excited because the place was two doors down [from Supper] and it was available. We jumped the gun.”

Upon going back to the drawing board and finding the space on Rivington, they were approved for a beer and wine license from the board immediately. The new restaurant, set to open on October 4, will be the first of Mr. Prisinzano’s ventures to cross below Houston Street. Read more…

Courtesy of “Blogologues” The “Blogologues” production team from left to right: Assistant director Meredith Hackman, director Megan Loughran, co-producers Allison Goldberg and Jen Jamula, and stage manager Jim Armstrong

When an online phenomenon escapes the bounds of the digital world and emerges IRL (in real life), bloggers are fond of proclaiming “the intertubes are leaking.” “Blogologues,” an upcoming show at Under St. Marks, will turn the spigot and let Internet culture gush out at full flow.

Each month, “Blogologues” will take real Internet postings on a theme and turn them into a stage show. And get this: The producers are taking suggestions from readers of The Local. Have any recommendable tweets, blog posts, even Craigslist ads? Don’t be shy. Leave them in the comments and they may end up being enacted on stage. Read more…

Susan Keyloun

Good morning, East Village.

Here’s something to consider if you’re considering snatching up one of those rogue cans of Four Loko: Gothamist picked up a study from the Annals of Emergency Medicine that revealed 11 patients under the influence of the banned beverage (10 of them underage) were treated in the Bellevue emergency room in the four month period in late 2010. One patient had fallen onto subway tracks and five others were found unconscious in public places.

The Post’s police blotter (via EV Grieve) has news of a high speed getaway from Tompkins Square Park by a suspected drug dealer. After nearly careening into a sergeant in the stolen minivan he was driving, Robert Ball briefly escaped before hitting traffic and was apprehended.

Also from the Post, word that Jimmy McMillan, who ran for governor on a platform of “the rent is too damn high,” is facing eviction from his $872.96 rent-controlled St. Marks Place apartment. Mr. McMillan’s landlord claims he is in violation of his lease because he actually lives in Brooklyn. Mr. McMillan has vowed to fight the case. Read more…

Leila Samii

Earlier this week, the Daily News pointed to the intersection of Essex and Delancey Streets as one of the deadliest in the city. Where bicycle accidents are concerned, it isn’t the only dangerous street crossing on the Lower East Side. In fact, data shows that the neighborhood boasts many of the intersections most prone to bicycle crashes.

The Local obtained records from the New York City Department of Transportation of cycling accidents in 2008 and 2009, the most recent years available. The records reported all intersections where four or more cycling accidents occurred in 2008, and three or more in 2009.

Of the 33 intersections on the list, nine are on the Lower East Side (three of those nine are on Houston Street, the border of the East Village). The data reported a total of 45 crashes at those intersections.

Midtown was the second most sketchy neighborhood with 38 crashes across its accident-prone intersections.
Read more…

We’ve now received more information about the disturbance that occurred at the 7th Precinct’s National Night Out yesterday. According to a police spokesman, a man fleeing the scene of a gang assault made an unlucky wrong turn and ran right into police listening to the precinct’s commanding officer as she addressed a crowd of local residents and elected officials.

The suspect was part of a group of seven who allegedly assaulted a 24-year-old man at Ridge and Stanton Streets at around 5:45 p.m. The suspect fled the scene, according to the police, but ran right into the gathering of around 70 people at Attorney and Stanton Streets.

As shown in the Local East Village’s video from the scene, the incident interrupted Deputy Inspector Nancy Barry’s welcoming speech mid-sentence as officers swarmed the suspect.

Read more…

Lauren Carol Smith

In exactly an hour, at 6:15 p.m., The BMW Guggenheim Lab will kick off its film programming with a screening of Blank City. The Local talked with Paul Dallas, the project’s film curator, to see what’s in store for the neighborhood.

How does Blank City reflect the history of the neighborhood?

The film is really a document of the “No Wave” and “Cinema of Transgression” arts scene that happened in the East Village and Lower East Side in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It was the time when people were squatting in buildings, before the real-estate boom of the eighties, and the moment when artists could live in close proximity and foster this anti-establishment sort of art scene. It shows what was happening in music and art at the time through rich moments that have had an effect on artists and filmmakers since.

Read more…

Lauren Carol Smith Television reporters interview a local about Eason Alonzio, a disabled man who was left in a van and died after six hours yesterday.

The police have confirmed to The Local East Village that the developmentally disabled man who died in the back of a van after being left there for six hours on Tuesday was a resident of the neighborhood. News vans are currently clogging East Fifth Street.

The 48-year-old, Eason Alonzio, was part of a group of disabled people driven to a daytime activity at 2082 Lexington Avenue in East Harlem at around 9 a.m, according to The Times.

The group got out of the van operated by AHRC New York City, but somehow Mr. Alonzio was left behind.

The police said that at around 2 p.m. the resident of 224 East Fifth Street, was found dead in a backseat.

A cause of death has not yet been determined. On Tuesday the temperature reached a high of 91 degrees.

Read more…

Ian Duncan The Avenue C poker club was robbed at gunpoint on Saturday. It has now closed. Below: a joker marks the club’s door.

Six card players were robbed at gunpoint late Saturday night in a poker club on Avenue C, according to police reports. Two armed men entered the New York City Poker Tour club shortly before 11 p.m. and ushered the players into a closet before robbing them. One player – identified by owner Jeremy Martin as Michael C. – had just returned from a successful night at a casino and was carrying $4,500 in cash.

Ian Duncan

The club had closed on Saturday night, but Mr. Martin and a few other players were inside after hours. The robbers knocked at the door and were let in. They quickly rounded up the players, took their cash and left.

Mr. Martin believes that he was “set up” by one of the players, because the gunmen shook down Michael first, before ordering the other players to empty their pockets.

Mr. Martin said no one was hurt in the robbery, but according to police reports, one person was punched in the face by the attackers. The robbers escaped with $6,500 in cash, a driver’s license and a Medicaid card.

Read more…

One Animus Arts Collective artist constructs a Flaming Cactus Saturday night

The “WALK MAN” that was erected in Tompkins Square Park over the weekend has already been vandalized (DNA Info has the story), but another art installation is still standing. Over the weekend, a group of roughly ten artists calling themselves the Animus Arts Collective transformed fourteen East Village lampposts into “Flaming Cactus” displays.

You may have seen some of the lampposts at Astor Place; four similar lampposts, festooned with fluorescent cables to resemble cacti, are located on Governor’s Island.

Officials with the New York City Department of Transportation commissioned the project in order to mark the route of the D.O.T.’s fourth annual Summer Streets program. Read more…

Karl Fischer An exclusive rendering of the new building bound for 427 East 12th Street

When the news first broke that a new six-story residential building at 427 East 12th Street would be designed by controversial architect Karl Fischer, speculation immediately ensued about its appearance.

Now, The Local has obtained a rendering of the building, which is marked by floor-to-ceiling windows and a penthouse that sits two stories above its neighbors. The developer of the building, Shaky Cohen, said that he and Mr. Fischer had strived to make the building fit into the neighborhood.

“We try to blend in to the neighborhood. We try not to be a focal point,” Mr. Cohen said. “Obviously it’s a modern building — we’re not going to replicate a design from the 1930s.”

He added that the building will feature a pair of one-bedroom apartments on floors two through five, with the ground floor accommodating an apartment with a backyard, and the top floor a penthouse. The building will also include perks like a virtual doorman and a communal roof deck.

But two local preservationists scoffed when they saw Mr. Fischer’s design.

Read more…

Marit Molin Sherwin Zabala stands in front of the construction that he says is hurting his Downtown Floor Supplies store on Lafayette Street.

Three business owners at the corner of Lafayette and Bleecker Streets say that construction on a new subway passage is warding off customers, leading to their revenue plummeting by as much as 50 percent. Workers for the Metropolitan Transit Authority have been busy since 2009, building a passageway between the uptown 6 train at Bleecker Street and the Broadway-Lafayette station. Unfortunately for the businesses at the entrance to the downtown 6 train, the latest phase of work, which according to an M.T.A. spokesman started four weeks ago, requires a construction zone that occupies parking spaces in the area and forms a barrier in front of the three store entrances. Read more…