Seen & Heard: Nickel & Diner

••• Finally got around to trying Nickel & Diner at Centre and Howard. It was a lot better than I expected, given the stylishness. I ordered the kale cashew bowl, which sounds like everything that’s wrong with food in 2017, but it was tasty. Served warm and laden with black beans, haricot verts, farro, quinoa, and a butter-garlic sauce—so it was nutritious but not exactly dietetic. (Plus: worthwhile fries and an excellent cappuccino made with Nobletree beans.) They’re still waiting on their liquor license.

••• For those who have been asking: Community Board 1 passed Khe-Yo‘s application for sidewalk seating, with modifications (closing at 9:30/10:30 p.m. rather than an hour later, as requested, and five tables rather than six). The restaurant is now working with the Department of Consumer Affairs to finalize it.

••• Nice to see the Odeon support its staff yesterday. (And the dinner offerings were limited to a soup, a salad, two burgers, and fries.) Thanks to J. for the tip.

••• Tribeca Hair Studio on Chambers appears to be closing. Thanks to James for the heads-up. UPDATE: “I was in Tribeca Hair Studio last week and was told they are just moving to an available space on Chambers closer to Broadway,” commented Molly. That could mean the former Shelter Chic or Tasti D-Lite stores.

••• Sorry to see Spin Ceramics closed its Crosby Street store. Bought some good stuff there.

••• Opening today at Taymour Grahne Gallery: “Try to Smoke It, an exhibition of eight painters, curated by Holly Coulis. Within this group of painters, each makes work that sits somewhere along the spectrum from flat abstraction to flattened, abstracted representation. Each creates their own specific world of paint and image by using varying degrees of flatness, either via color or picture plane, to create some type of illusion.”

••• I didn’t moon them this time, but maybe I should’ve—I might’ve gotten more than a lone half-smile.

 

7 Comments

  1. I was in Tribeca Hair Studio last week and was told they are just moving to an available space on Chambers closer to Broadway…but one never knows…

  2. Perhaps someone with better commercial real estate knowledge than me can answer this. I know landlords are not renewing leases (since commercial leases are usually very long term) in order to try to get a higher paying tenant but why not just renew for a shorter period of time, like one or two years and re-evaluate instead of keeping the place vacant for years on end?

    • Typically retail tenants don’t want the uncertainty of having a short-term lease.

    • Tenants often invest a significant amount in sunk buildout / startup costs and they need to amortize that cost over a longer term.

    • One can see the vacancies, but one cannot really know which leases are being extended or renewed before they ever come to market. A going concern would really try to make a deal with their landlord well before the place is listed. However some places cannot survive even at the existing, pre-renewal lease rent.

  3. Tribeca Hair Studio is moving into the former Tasti Dlite spot

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