Melissa finally baking, food from organs, espresso replaces tea, all within a few blocks on the Upper West Side

The Upper West Side has suddenly come alive with shops, stores, and shops, restaurants, sellers, vendors, and stores. Is this an economic revival, or merely the return of civilization?

But first, some creative signs pasted to the windows of the old Starlight Diner, and whatever it was that was next door.

On Broadway in the low ’80s, the competition for cupcake dollars intensifies:

After you’ve fattened them up, have their photos taken at Amsterdam & 79th:

Occupying what was once half of Avventura (other half still there), food grown from live organs, or perhaps organisms or organizations.

Opening tomorrow, a boutique espresso machine and pod shop moving into where recently you could buy boutique tea.

Hmmmmmm… Something(s) is (are) wrong with these signs. Can you find it (them)? Answers posted August 13, 2019.

 

Something else opening, Amsterdam Ave.

Let us pause to critique the awning. Note the typeface distribution: left to just right of center, a sans serif. To the right, a classic serif font. Nice use of an outsized ampersand. To my eye, the effect is unbalanced with too little weight on the left, the number an almost afterthought followed by too much green space. Then suddenly pecan, bold but lowercase and completely filling the margin. Crammed in on the right: “barista & a cook, “lowercase. Kudos for including the street number. Overall, the effort shows that a hint of thought went into the design, but the end result looks too much like a first draft for any award consideration.

Scooter vs. e-bike.

Newsstand.

For today’s photos, we used artsy filters.

 

Another sign-holding job created

West 79th St., in front of the only Chase branch for two blocks in any direction. Filene’s will have been on the northeast corner.

79th, between Broadway and Amsterdam.

Pigeons swoop dramatically across the world-famous Gateway McDonald’s Arc de Triomphe  in Washington Square.

NYC businesses still closing, but…

…I don’t feel much lately like snapping photos of closed storefronts anymore. They’re still popping up or popping out and staying empty for a long time, too. People continue to walk by giving me the blurry person effect I like so much. I just don’t take the shot very often any longer, and when I do I often delete them. Perhaps these four disconnected images should have been deleted.

Sometimes photos make their way from the SD card onto the laptop, and from there it’s only a matter of some clicks and drags and typing and here they end up. I like the rust in the first shot.

I get a lot of junk mail and you can do whatever you want to try to stop it, but it can’t be stopped. You can impede it for awhile, but it comes back in increasing volume. Here’s a typical two- or three-day accumulation. The pile on the left is unwanted catalogs and things to be shred without being opened. The pile on the right: bills and a magazine or two. Shred, recycle, repeat. I found the prospect of the never-endingness of this cycle so dispiriting that cropping or fixing anything about the image was never a consideration.

However, I do like finding old signs faded into brick.

A bicyclist barrels down Columbus Avenue early one morning.

We’re moving soon…

…actually, they – a travel agent – moved already. The Place, their sign, and the bright red facade are from so long ago it’s someone else’s memory.

Something Opening on UWS

Yee ha.

The tile floor from the entrance to Manhattan Diner remains for now.

Clark Kent works construction now that print media is dead.

Tourists exit bus and approach Central Park.

 

Farewell H&H…

He really didn’t want to be photographed this morning. He was handing out flyers for a rally.

A few of the last day’s customers.

People coming and going Friday.

The penultimate bag: four poppies, four sesame.

H & H Broadway & 80th store closing?

At least it appears that way in a classic New York landlord/small business conflict. I stopped in this morning and asked a bagelrista what was going on.

Bagelrista: We have to get out.

Me: Are you moving to a new location?

Bagelrista: We don’t know. They’re trying to work something out. $1.40.

I paid her for the bagel. There you have it. This is completely unconfirmed with any other sources, so hold a candlelight vigil at your own risk.

TeaGschwendner leaves NYC – is H&H doomed?

Teagschwendner, a German seller of teas, has vacated its Upper West Side space just days after providing a free sample to my daughter. Half of their sign has been removed.

According to the West Side Rag, all of the store’s tea has been shipped to another store. The NYC store has also been removed from TeaGschwendner’s web site.

This small jewelry store on Broadway and 80th is on the way out.

Is H&H doomed?

The signs and the awning are gone, but the doors are open and the bagels are still there. Is the original H&H at 80th and Broadway doomed or just getting a facelift?

New Pizza Town closes; east side of Broadway between 77th and 78th St. awaits demolition

Santo and the guy in all the photos with celebrities had been at SE corner of Broadway & 78Th for 30 or 35 years, depending on who you asked. This past Friday, they abruptly closed and loaded the contents of their prototypical NY pizza joint onto a rented truck. In little more than a decade I ate 1439 slices of their pizza.

Santo on right, guy in all the photos on left.

The rest of the block…

Rumor is, a 22-story apartment building will be erected on this site, connected to the building that went up over the comedy club on 78th. What stores will replace the shuttered businesses on this block? No doubt at least one bank, three mobile phone stores, a Seattle-based coffee purveyor, a nail salon, a Duane Reade or two…

Looked up, saw signs, East 32nd and 33rd

I shifted my gaze from the tops of my shoes and street level and there, painted long ago on the sides of brick buildings, were signs still visible decades after their businesses became defunct. 

Magid Handbags and Coblentz bags and Alan Mill, gone since the fifties. Click here for a great website and more info.

Stiner & Berlfein, again, click for the full story.  My photo is 8 years newer than the one in the story and the paint is starting to show some wear.