March 25, 2015 Arts & Culture, Community News, History, Restaurant/Bar News, Shopping
••• “Anyone remember when north Battery Park [City] looked this this?” tweeted @hannahhemoch. Wow.
••• Got to meet Ned Baldwin yesterday—he’s the chef opening Houseman in the former 508 space on Greenwich (below Spring)—along with a peek at the under-construction space. He’s shooting for a late spring/early summer opening.
••• Charles Komanoff reports on the concert the other night at David Gage String Instruments, a benefit for Arts for Art with wine and home-cooked food: “Free-jazz piano legend Dave Burrell played a 20-minute original suite and then held the house rapt with genuinely felt stories of the Lower Manhattan avant-garde arts scene from the sixties to the present. He kicked it off by looking around the second floor space, with hundreds of stringed instruments racked on the balcony and dozens of us on folding chairs below, saying, ‘This reminds me a lot of the sixties, and that makes me feel happy.’ A cool scene that was also warm.”
••• Press release: “The Howard Hughes Corporation announced today the development of Seaport Studios at the Seaport District, a unique two-level retail destination that will showcase a series of top emerging designers beginning late spring. Seaport Studios will feature an eclectic mix of fashion, art, food and beverage in a curated environment to create a retail destination unlike any other in New York City. Scott Studenberg and John Targon of Baja East are the first of many emerging fashion designers to be announced as part of the program.” It’s at Fulton and Front.
••• There used to be a terrific tree in front of 157 Hudson (for many years), but it’s gone—along with the trees to the north. I feel like there are chopped-down trees all over the neighborhood, with holes in the ground and sometimes the sliced-off trunk still visible. Does anyone know what’s going on? Not just with the Hudson block but the trees in general. UPDATE: I hear the tree in front of 157 Hudson was hit by a truck last fall. And one of the trees in front of 161 Hudson was a victim of Hurricane Sandy.
••• The 1st Precinct Community Council meeting is March 26 at 6:30 p.m. at the station house.
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Yes, I remember North Battery Park city that way. Cirque Du Soleil used to set up tents on the muddy fields that are now River House. We saw some equestrian show under tents in what was open fields. 96 is not that long ago.
Cirque and the horse show were not in North BPC, they were in South BPC, around where the Jewish Heritage Museum is now. It was a weird experience to step outside my back door and walk into a circus tent.
I remember Art on the Beach back in the early 80s in what was to become North BPC.
The southernmost tree in front of the Con Ed substation on West Broadway between Leonard and Franklin has been chopped down. There is a Fresh Direct truck stationed there 24/7. Those trees were all dead on the side facing the substation. One has to wonder about the food i the truck.
The tree in front of 157 Hudson was knocked over at 7:15pm on December 5, 2014. There was very heavy Holland Tunnel traffic on Hudson. A large box truck ran the curb. The truck struck and uprooted the tree. The force of the collision felt like an earthquake. Ladder 5 arrived and spent a couple hours sawing the tree into pieces. The pieces remained on the side of Hudson St. for a few days until sanitation removed them. I do not know if the driver was issued a citation. I do not know when Parks will replace the tree. It was a great tree. RIP
Howard Hughes Corp – Seaport Studios? Tone-deaf, artificial attempt at being New-York -y , grassroots -y. As Michael Kinsley once wrote (about Al Gore) “. . . like an old person’s idea of a young person.” Baja looks like the fashion equivalent of Truffles.