(Photos: Daniel Maurer)
Ian Schrager’s Public Hotel opened on Chrystie Street last month with a Patti Smith performance in its basement club, Public Arts. Since then, the venue, which modestly bills itself as “the first new idea since [Schrager’s] Studio 54 forty years ago,” has hosted performers like Slick Rick as well as the “late-night hot, sweaty dancing” it promised on its webpage. But we haven’t heard all that much about the hotel’s rooftop bar.
A Driggs Avenue woman, 28, is believed to have died from a head injury after falling from her loft bed. [DNA Info]
Between Sunday and Wednesday this week, four violent robberies occurred on the Lower East Side, including a cab driver who was punched in the eye and relieved of $25. [DNA Info]
Compared to one year ago, the cost to rent a ground floor retail space has increased by an average of 42 percent Greenpoint, and decreased by an average of 18 percent in Williamsburg. [The Real Deal] More →
(Photos: Daniel Maurer)
It’s officially ice cream sandwich season, meaning everything from the donut ice cream sandwich at Peter Pan to the babka ice cream sandwich at Russ & Daughters. And now there’s a new one in the mix: Turin-born Italian gelato brand Gelarto has opened a shop on the corner of Avenue A and East 9th, and they’re serving up ice cream sandwiches made with brioche buns.
As East Villagers mourn the loss of Great Jones Cafe, a hidden gem that opened around the same time has quietly closed in Chelsea.
Great Jones Cafe.
New Yorkers today learned some shocking news: beloved Cajun/Creole restaurant Great Jones Cafe will close tonight and may or may not reopen. Tipsters told EV Grieve that tonight would be the last night, but there’s reason to hope rumors of the 34-year-old Basquiat hangout’s death are greatly exaggerated. This evening, an employee at the Jones told Bedford + Bowery that it’s closing for a week; after that it will reopen — or not. More likely not, she said.
Messages left for owner James Moffett have not yet been returned. In April, the restaurant’s longtime GM, Bill Judkins, told EV Grieve that he was forced out when he couldn’t see eye to eye with his two partners, who “feel that the Jones needs to be changed into something more contemporary to appeal to the ‘new’ neighborhood.” The restaurant’s famous jukebox had been turned off, Judkins told Grieve.
In January of 2015, Judkins told Eater that the restaurant’s landlord was “a nice, old school guy,” and that there were still “a few years” left on the lease. Eater wrote that Judkins “doesn’t see things changing anytime soon, although he does admit to some ‘concern’ about what will happen in the future.”
We’re hoping the Noho fixture rises Lazarus-like from the dead. (I mean, where else can you get a proper oyster po boy around here? Served up by Pavement bassist Mark Ibold, no less.) But many are operating on the assumption that the restaurant won’t be coming back. They filed onto social media to pay their respects:
I’ve run the numbers and I’ve had 3 significant, 5 moderately significant and 10 uneventful nights at Great Jones Cafe. RIP pie & catfish.
— Sloane Crosley (@askanyone) July 26, 2017
R.I.P. Great Jones Cafè – I remember being served drinks by Pavement bassist Mark Ibold back in the day: https://t.co/c1DQpHxnJl
— Patrick Keane (@phkeane) July 26, 2017
I went to Great Jones Cafe the first week I moved to NYC because somebody told me Mark Ibold from Pavement bartended there.
— Jason Diamond (@imjasondiamond) July 26, 2017
Sad to hear #greatjonescafe shutters tonight. I had more great times there than I can count. Also, my life changed course at Great Jones. pic.twitter.com/2m2KpjtrKI
— michael arthur (@inklines) July 26, 2017
Just found out that Great Jones Cafe AND the Village French Roast are closing so why even bother going to NYC anymore
— nicole steinberg (@nicolebrett) July 26, 2017
French Roast, Great Jones Cafe, & Republic are all closing. Soon NYC restaurants will be like flying – you’re either in 1st class or coach
— Christopher Shinn (@chris_shinn) July 26, 2017
Abby Quinn, Edie Falco and Jenny Slate appear in Landline by Gillian Robespierre, an official selection of the U.S. Dramatic Competition at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. (Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Chris Teague.)
A while back we noted that bygone East Village record shop Other Music makes an appearance in Landline, Gillian Robespierre and Jenny Slate’s follow-up to Obvious Child. And then we noted that Greenpoint vinyl repository The Thing makes an appearance in Brooklyn filmmaker Dustin Guy Defa’s forthcoming film, Person to Person.
New York Costumes purchased its Fourth Avenue residence of 21 years for $24.5 million. [The Real Deal]
Japanese lifestyle brand Muji will open it’s first Brooklyn store at 200 Wythe Avenue in September. [Curbed NY]
Having recently relocated to Greenwich Avenue, actress Meg Ryan sold her Mercer Street apartment of four years for $9.9 million. [LLNYC] More →
City councilman Stephen Levin speaks during press conference.
“There is a no more senseless or inhumane action than to leave a body in the street,” declared city councilman Ydanis Rodriguez at a news conference earlier today at the Greenpoint intersection where 27-year-old Neftaly Ramirez was struck and killed by a hit-and-run driver early Saturday morning.
New York has become such a cutthroat coffee town that baristas have to grace their latte foam with dancing hot dogs in order to stand out. So who’s the Master of the Marzocco, and which coffee roaster makes the best brew? Hit these two coffee competitions to find out.
The cyclist killed by a trash truck in Greenpoint this weekend has been identified as East Village resident and Paulie Gee’s employee Neftaly “Neffy” Ramirez. [DNA Info]
Yesterday on Graham Avenue, 100+ firefighters quelled a blaze that broke up above Ore Bar. No injuries were reported. [DNA Info]
PDT [Please Don’t Tell]’s Jeff Bell, a seven-year veteran of the East Village cocktail haven, won Bartender of the Year 2017 at this weekend’s Spirited Awards in New Orleans. [Gothamist] More →