Vanishing New York Backup

A grim look at the future LES , where super-high rents are "buoyed by the arrival of high-profile newcomers like the men’s wear designer John Varvatos." As one luxury shop begets another... [ Times ] Landmarks Preservation Committee says the Provincetown Playhouse isn't worth saving . [ Curbed ] ...And the new playhouse is revealed. [ Curbed ] Here we go again-- how many of us will be pushed to Philadelphia after the next round of rent hikes? [ Gothamist ] "Park Slope has so much juice, just like Manhattan. It's got a lot of pizzazz and energy." And that means it's about to be put through the Darren Star machine. For all who believe the boroughs are safe from being SATC'd , here is the future. [ Gothamist ] The saga of 49 E. Houston and Steve Stollman continues. [ Voice ] Take a peek at our dear, old redbirds at the bottom of the sea. [ City Room ] When you're super-rich and you run out of room, what's there to do except buy a passel of t...

I recently reported that the Stuyvesant Polyclinic on 2nd Ave between 8th and 9th returned to the market as a single family. Today, the “Buy This Mansion” signs have been taken down from where they were (illegally) bolted to the landmarked, 124-year-old, carved terra cotta façade, and demolition men are hard at work on the interior . Unless it's been rented out for another TV show, apparently, someone heeded the signs and bought this mansion. The demolition guy I talked with believed it had sold and said, "I don't know what they're gonna do with it, but they can't do much--it's a landmark." So who bought it? The broker's listing hoped a rock star like Lenny Kravitz would buy the building for $13 million and install an “indoor/outdoor saltwater swimming pool exiting to your gigantic organic garden” along with other whimsies. I got very curious about what’s inside and while the place was being shown last week, I sneaked in to take a few interior shots....

Show World Center, the last of that bastion of all things nasty, is gasping its last breath on 8th Avenue. Today, Curbed and Gawker both picked up on the Post's report : " The Times Square area's once-raunchiest location is up for lease or sale , possibly spelling an end to what's left of porn king Richard Basciano's Show World Center at Eighth Avenue and 42nd Street." I am stricken by the news. Though Show World mostly disappeared a few years ago , it still retained a neon-lit rabbit warren of backroom and underground porn-tastic hideaways filled with video peeps, DVDs, magazines, and toys. You enter on 8th Avenue, but follow the many doorways and stairways, and you'll find yourself cast down and back, emerging after your adventure into daylight on 42nd, next to the entrance to a hotel that sports a gold glittering lobby. (You will also find a treasure-trove of vintage Penthouse magazines , dating back to the 60s and 70s, on sale for a few bucks.) It s...

While, in this case, I can honestly say, "at least it's not a bank or a Starbucks," still... ...for this we lost Sucelt? P.S. How many "portable devices" can you find in this picture? Sucelt Coffee Shop Ken Friedman at Sucelt Say Goodbye to Sucelt Old Sign, Defiant Doodle

This post originally appeared on Eater , but I repeat it here because I think it bears repeating. Very soon the venerable Minetta Tavern will close and go to Keith McNally, the man behind Pastis and Balthazar, often blamed/credited with turning the Meatpacking District into "MePa." Last week I went into Minetta for a final meal and cocktail and talked with owner Taka Becovic who told me he plans to close "May 1...or maybe a couple days later." That's not May 6, as a bartender told Grub Street , so if you want to be sure you get a chance to say goodbye, you'd better go by May Day. Originally from Montenegro, near Albania, Taka first worked as a busboy at the Minetta Tavern. Thirteen years ago, he bought the place and kept every inch of it intact, including the Italian menu, which will change to French bistro food under McNally . “I like old-fashioned places,” Taka said, “family-style Italian.” The music he had playing was Frank Sinatra, Keely Smith...

Dutch Kills gets killed by glassy, spaceship hotels --14 are going up in just an 8-block area. Locals watch their neighborhood vanish before their eyes. [ NYT ] I've been wondering what's happening to the Hotel Breslin residents now that their home is going boutique hotel with developers whose philosophy is "all about taking historic buildings to the next level." Which means booting existing tenants. [ Chelsea Now ] View the trailer for Nick Schlyer's film: Voices of the Breslin . Photographer Jill Freedman returns to the city she documented in the gritty 70s and 80s. She captured ambivalent feelings about those times, saying: "There are days I walk down the street feeling its ugliness on my skin like a sunburn...other days when I can hardly catch my breath for the beauty of it." [ NYT ] Watch the great interview with Jill : photo: Jill Freedman 24-year-old LES boutique leaves Ludlow because it's just too touristy. [ Urbanite ] In other fabulous ...

Last week, New York magazine published a neighborhood guide to Yorkville , and once that happens you know the area will soon be vanished. The guide, with map, does provide a handy tour of Yorkville's oldest survivors. It's not a neighborhood I spend much time in, so I went up there to pay a visit before it's too late. I'll be posting more soon, but I thought I'd start off with the Heidelberg restaurant . the Georgica condo rises next to and above Heidelberg Dating back to 1936, it's the last of Yorkville's once-plentiful German restaurants. The Times aptly described it as "swathed in history, presenting its worn and faded face without touch-ups or apologies." Heidelberg is a comfortable place to be--and the place to be is most definitely the bar. Presided over by a smiling, bespectacled, and gray-haired barmaid named Hilde, the bar is where red-faced men drink their beer from boots made of glass. The 2-liter boots require a credit card deposit an...

Here are the links from part two of my two-day stint as guest blogger on the Curbed network . Please visit the links to read the complete stories and view photos: Battle for 9th Ave Still Rages A Final Visit to Minetta Tavern 13th Street History Revealed Making Room for Costas Kondylis's Tumor EV Gets Spice

Only the elderly care to save the villages from the grip of NYU . Is that true? [ Observer ] via [ Curbed ] Check out this review of the Bob Gruen opening at the old CBGB 313 space. Life (and art) goes on... [ Stupefaction ] Grub Street reports the Minetta Tavern will close May 6, but Minetta's owner told me it's more like "May 1...or so." He's not sure himself, so you make sure to get there before May if you want to say goodbye to this Village landmark before it gets Balthazared. [ Eater ] Is nothing sacred? In Bay Ridge a luxury developer has had 211 century-old corpses dug up and relocated from their places of "eternal" rest to make room for his condo. Even in death, we can never escape the creeping hands of eviction. [ Gothamist ] A Bay Ridger is on the scene .

For the next couple of days, I'll be guest blogging on Curbed . I will add links here to my posts there as they go live. Please click through to Curbed for the full stories and photos: NYU Is Demolishing the Provincetown Playhouse Imminent Peril at the Village Inn Manhattan Mall Ghost Town A Hoyda Rising Fast on Ludlow Pink 14th Street Destructoporn

I’ve noticed more and more that New Yorkers have become rather cavalier about their possessions. Parents leave $500 strollers unattended on sidewalks . Girls leave bicycles unlocked on the street . Now here’s a guy with total confidence that his iBook will never get swiped. At the weird "MePa Plaza" —that popular little patch of exhaust-choked potted plants on the 9th Avenue median strip—I watched a guy walk away from his laptop. He disappeared for a couple of minutes. Where did he go? Then I spotted him yards away flirting and bumming a smoke from a girl on the other side of the plaza. He never once turned to check and make sure his laptop was still there. So what is this about? A sign of low crime, a new freedom in the city? No. It's a sign of people who are clueless, who can afford not to care if their stuff gets stolen. I mean, hey, this was right in front of the Apple store--if your iBook gets swiped there, you can just buy another one. It's a chance to upgrade. ...

I just posted on Steve Stollman's place on Houston , wondering where he went and why. Looks like, thanks to a buyback, he might be coming back in 2 years --but the bike activists may not be coming with him. [ Voice] Of course, Steve would have to move back into a hideous, tumorous, monster of a building made by someone called "Sultan's DaVinci." [ Curbed ] At long last, the subway barber photographer is back in action. [ Subway Barbers ] The "Iron Triangle Freeze Out" is already killing the small businesses of Willets Point . [ NYDN ] Join the anti-gentrification romp in Tompkins Square Park this Saturday and celebrate through your pain. [ SLES ] Michael Perlman , savior of diners , is profiled in the Observer. [ NYO ] And it's another boutique hotel for rapidly dying Chinatown. [ NYO ]

Ninth Avenue is fading fast, so I'm highlighting some of the businesses along that vanishing thoroughfare before they go. I recently covered the soon-to-perish block between 17th and 18th, along with Manganaro's (not vanishing) and the Cheyenne Diner (moving to Red Hook). Still alive and kicking between 44th and 45th, don't miss the Poseidon Bakery . As far as I know, it is not vanishing. Yet. The Poseidon has been in town since 1923 and is the last bakery in the city where they still make their own phyllo dough by hand. Opened by Demetrios Anagnostou, a baker from the island of Corfu, the Poseidon is run by family, including Lili Fable , third-generation baker and one of the founders (in 1973) of the Ninth Avenue International Food Festival , which is coming up in May. The inside of the Poseidon, with its blue and white paint job, feels not unlike walking onto a fishing vessel. There's something very "seaside" about it. It also looks like it hasn't cha...

After my night outside the grand opening of Varvatos' new Bowery store , I went into the shop for the first time. Walking in, I got a confusing mix of emotions. It feels almost authentic. The vinyl, the scabby walls, the ragged clothing. I found myself feeling "not bad" about it. But then you look closer: The records are preciously pricey, the walls are preserved under Plexiglas, and the clothing is beyond pricey--a used Cheap Trick t-shirt goes for $250. photo: hardcore shutterbug While I expect many pro-Vongerichtifiers to support Varvatos' move into the CBGB space, I keep thinking about the surprising pro-Varvatos outcry from punks and other neighborhood people. That night, and in the media, they kept saying, "It's better than a Starbucks or a bank." This sentiment echoes throughout the debate. From the Times' report, Jesse Malin of D Generation said, “I’d rather see this than a Dunkin’ Donuts or a Starbucks,” and Blondie's Clem Burk...

Michael Perlman sent me a press release with the good news: The Cheyenne Diner is staying close to home! "The architecturally & culturally significant Cheyenne Diner has been purchased, and will gain a new lease on life when transported to Red Hook, Brooklyn. A contract has been signed between property owner George Papas and its new owner, Mike O'Connell of O’C Construction, son of influential Red Hook developer, Greg O’Connell." Greg O'Connell has been called "the real Goliath in Red Hook" for being its biggest property owner, but he actually sounds like a decent guy--"a socialist developer," according to this interview , in which he worries about the loss of artists and mom-and-pops. If he truly is this conscientious and if his son takes after him, then the Cheyenne might really be in good hands. Moondance Update Cheyenne Diner

May 3, 1:00-3:00, 9th Ave and 17th St: Chelsea activists Miguel Acevedo and Gloria Sukenick are putting together a protest to help save the mom-and-pop shops of 9th Avenue . For more info about the committee, call Miguel at 646-671-0310 or Gloria at 212-741-3562: The Post mocks: "boohoo, it's unfair, etc., etc." that CBGB is now a high-end clothing store. [ EVG ] Bob Arihood posts his excellent pics and account of the Varvatos opening night on Bowery, with insight into the fights that ensued. [ NMNL ] Bobby Steele recounts his Varvatos night fight : "They were telling me what 'PUNK' is. 'It's not punk'. So, I finally had enough, and said 'This is PUNK!' and spit on them." [ The Undead ] via [ Can't Stop The Bleeding ] A festive Record Store Day was had by all. [ Stupefaction ] [ Flaming P ] The NYPL has a show coming up on the use of eminent domain in the city . [ Urbanite ] The Nuyorican Poets Cafe turns 35 on Ma...

It was on flickr that I became acquainted with the work of Tony Marciante. I was searching for images of Ratner’s Second Avenue when I found his collection covering a fire at 2nd and 5th in 1969. Impressed with his evocative work, I asked him to join the Vanishing New York flickr group and I interviewed him for this blog. woman with rescued parrot Tony Marciante has been taking photographs “off and on” for the past 40 years. Born on the Lower East Side and raised in Brooklyn, in the 1960s he moved back to the neighborhood where his grandmother had immigrated in 1906 and where she stayed to the end of her life. He lived throughout the 60s on 7th Street, in an East Village he recalls as “magical and full of life,” filled with “immigrants, Beats and Hippies. It continued to be a modern-day melting pot. Outside of St. Mark's Place, the old shops and the streets looked like they did since they were settled by my grandmother's generation.” ladies at Schrafft's He began taking p...

Last night I stood outside the grand opening of the John Varvatos store on Bowery , watching and listening to the battle for New York's soul rage on. When I arrived, Varvatos was on the sidewalk being interviewed for a film about CBGB's by rock documentarian Ernie Fritz . Varvatos talked about all the good he believes he's doing for rock 'n' roll and the neighborhood . Varvatos and Sid Vicious Soon, the fashionistas and old punks started rolling through the labyrinth of ropes guarded by big, burly bouncers and girls with clipboards dressed in "Varvatos 315 Bowery: Birthplace of Punk" t-shirts . I was not on their list and could not get inside . I waited for Rebecca Moore and her protesters to arrive. Reverend Billy was in the group. I asked him why he came out for the protest. He told me, "I'm dismayed by the blasphemy of CBGB's being overtaken by what looks like Soho. Are we going to get Soho'd all the way to Alphabet City? ...

Patrick Hedlund of The Villager interviews "savvy bloggers" me and Brooks of Lost City for their Mixed Use column this week. Check out the complete article here and here's an excerpt: The brains behind Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York and Lost City consistently update their metro-centric Web sites with original news about neighborhood openings and closings, and commentary on the city’s ongoing evolution, with an overriding sense of mourning for the New York of yore. "Unfortunately, there’s always stuff to write about ,” said Lost City blogger Brooks of Sheffield, who, as a working journalist by day, uses a pen name for his site. “These places are treasures, and once they’re gone, they’re irreplaceable.” Lost City, which recently chronicled the changes — or, as Brooks found, lack thereof — on the Lower East Side’s Ludlow St. over the past decades, often breaks news that feeds some of the city’s larger real estate media, such as Curbed.com and the big dailies. The sam...

Protest at Varvatos on Bowery tonight! There's nothing we can do but at least it feels like something. [ Bk Vegan ] via [ Curbed ] Varvatos preserving the aggression, excitement, passion of CBGB's ? He says his shop is "made for this neighborhood." [ Observer ] Rocco, the barber of Spring Street , is cutting his hours. Ethan Hauser, I have two suggestions for you: The New Barber Shop on 9th Ave and The Clover in Park Slope. But you better go soon. [ NYT ] Elettaria, the first of 8th Street's trendy-luxe new wavers , is a favorite of " rowdy bankers and...striking blondes debating the merits of launching their own reality show." [ TONY ] via [ Curbed ] The new New York: Where even the city buses are lux-lux-luxury! But do they come with diplomat plates? [ City Room ] The EV is pissed at Frank's flood of 20-somethings "on their cell phones, flinging around their elbows ." [ Eater ] Many more citizens bristle in the company of crowded, no...

Tipster Sally fills us in on last night's very successful CB3 meeting where NYU and the East Village community gathered to discuss the fate of Met Foods. She writes: " NYU has met their match. The room was packed with the community--young, old, in between . A young, fashionable NYU student who shops at Met Foods came to say she was outraged at NYU , the school she'd dreamed about going to since she was a child. People, many NYU graduates over the years, spoke eloquently and intelligently about what NYU is doing to the neighborhood. NYU is a not-for-profit organization that took in the neighborhood of 1.6 billion dollars last year tax-free! Over 2500 signatures were gathered on a petition, and 300 more on an online petition in less than 2 weeks , and NYU was told if they don't work with Michael (Met Foods manager) and his brother, we'll get 10,000 more. NYU was told by the audience that they need to be 'punished' and investigated. People called for the wit...

Yesterday Curbed reported that a former bike shop at 49 East Houston is to become a giant, 14-story, tumorous, cantilevered, residential building . Awful to contemplate, especially considering that the bike shop was not just a bike shop. photo: Richard Perry/New York Times The building, built in the 19th century, was owned by Steve Stollman who used the space to sell antique bars as well as original Automat machines. It was always fun to go inside and see Steve's Automats, along with a strange collection of people, posters, and other unusual things. He originally had 85 Automat machines --Abe Lebewohl even put one in the entrance of the Second Avenue Deli. As they say on Passover, "It would have been enough," but 49 E. Houston was about even more than those lovely Automats. Stollman used the space to provide a refuge for bicycle activists , including Time's Up and Critical Mass. And, as a former newsstand vendor himself, he also gave "aid and comfort to news de...

New York is filled with hidden pieces of its own vanished history. One of those pieces is tucked away behind the big yellow public school on 11th Street and 6th Avenue. There you will find, built into the back wall of the school's cafeteria, an impressive set of Gothic-revival wrought-iron railings. These are all that remain of Rhinelander Gardens . Berenice Abbott photo my flickr Built in 1854 and designed by James Renwick, architect of Grace Church and St. Patrick's Cathedral, Rhinelander Gardens featured decorated balconies and front gardens. Looking at it now, you might think it was for the very wealthy, but its rental apartments harbored many artists. John Cheever lived there. So did Robert Motherwell. Theodor Dreiser wrote An American Tragedy here. Rhinelander Gardens stood on 11th Street for a century before it was demolished. In the 1950s, the city wanted a school and the choice was between Rhinelander or Patchin Place. (Back in the day when writers and art...