Tag: brooklyn

New York is great, near or far

It’s been a year since I’ve visited or wrote about New York City. I miss it. Alas I don’t think I’ll be going to the States / NYC any time soon for a number of reasons. There are many in the same situation, so much that it seems to be having an impact. (Although it didn’t seem to limit Paul McCartney, who played a few surprise concerts in NYC in the last year. The man is everywhere.)

In the meantime, I’ve been following along with what’s been happening in the city, especially on the dining scene. After four years of a vegan menu, meat is back on at Eleven Madison Park restaurant. A place once impossible to get into seems less so: hence the addition of meat.

In other restaurant news, it seems there’s been a resurgence of new restaurants since the pandemic. That’s good to see. Also, it turns out young chefs are saving old school diners. Good for them.

One thing that came about during the pandemic was outdoor dining, but now that the pandemic is long gone, people are wondering: is outdoor dining dying off? I suspect it won’t. New Yorkers remain resilient and resourceful despite difficulties. I mean, you have restaurants thriving without kitchens there. I suspect restaurants will hold on to outdoor dining for some time, too.

Dining experiences in New York are about the Old as much as they are about the New. To show you what I mean, check out Resy’s great guide to New York’s New Old-School Restaurants. You’ll want to hit up some of them on your next visit. Maybe you’ll go to one of the greatest of old school establishments, Keens steakhouse, beloved by old and young diners alike.

Thinking of old school dining got me going down a rabbit hole of Manhattan nostalgia recently. Perhaps it was all the pieces I read about Lutèce after the great chef André Soltner died. Pieces like this and this and this. Those pieces lead me to read this: Reliving The 1980s: 10 Iconic New York Dining Moments That Defined Decadence. And then this: the 50 year club (i.e. the oldest upper west side shops and restaurants still in business). Which finally led me to this article on the battle for Bryant Park Grill, a famous restaurant which also happens to be a great piece of real estate.

Speaking of real estate, here’s a good story about my favorite building: cooper union is taking back the Chrysler building.

While ostensibly about the artists, this piece on the NYC apartment of Jean and Jean Claude Christo’s apartment got me thinking about living in downtown Manhattan when it was grittier. Perhaps that’s why I watched this not too long ago: ‘On the Bowery’. Very gritty indeed.

The Lower East Side is my favourite part of the city, which is why I was happy to read about the efforts to save the dive bar Lucy’s in the East Village. Meanwhile for Brooklyn fans, check out this hot pink building there. Or this Maximalist Brooklyn apartment. It’s not all light in that borough though. Check out as this grim piece on Brooklyn deaths possibly due to a serial killer. NYC is not without its dangers.

Like many people, I sometimes want New York to never change, though change it will. This year congestion pricing went in, and it turns out it’s a hit. That was fast. Not so fast is the adoption of trash bins. It boggles my mind, especially since a) no one likes all the rats b) bins wipe out rat populations. Go figure. Another antique thing that should change is the New York’s subway system. Good luck with that Herculean task. That said, they recently retired some of their  old subway cars. So even the subway system can adopt.

As for other changes, this piece on  the slow death of neon signage in New York made me wonder what the town would look like without bright neon. I can’t imagine it.

To close out, here’s a fun piece on the hardest working font in NYC. It looks like the NYPD is having a hard time recruiting cops. And the city is having a hard time figuring out how to bring people back to NYC. New York is never without challenges, no mater how much it changes.This piece by Naomi Fry writing about the famous piece by Jay McInerney on Chloe Sevigny in the New Yorker was very meta. Did I love this piece Jeannette Montgomery Barron’s black and white portraits of artists in Downtown New York in the 1980s? You know I did. Included in it is this photo of John Lurie, taken in 1982. Cool, like the city he was in.

Thanks for taking the time to read this. See you in a year when I post my annual appreciation of the greatest city in the world.

How to live in wonderful small spaces

Over at the blog Cup of Jo is a story of the 175 sq foot apartment and the woman who lives there. She has lots of tips on how to thrive in a small space.

I like the bold use of black and white to simplify the decor and make it seem less busy.

Looking at this small apartment reminded me of another small space also featured on that blog, this one being Erin Boyle’s:

Like the first place, Erin’s place is full of well curated pieces. And also like the first place, she is not afraid to put big pieces of furniture in a small space. (By the way, Erin has a book and a substack devoted to her way of life. I recommend both.)

Check out both of blog posts featuring their homes. Anyone living in or dreaming of living in a small space of their own will be inspired.

 

The great Steve Keene is having a moment

As Fineartsglobe.com says, Steve Keene is having a moment. Perhaps it’s because there is a new book on him: The Steve Keene art book. Whatever the reason, I am glad that he is getting more attention and recognition. Not that he is unknown. There’s been profiles done on him in Garden and Gun , Gothamist.com, BKMAG.com, Artsy.net…even the the New York Times.

if you don’t know him and wonder why you should care, read any of those pieces. In a nutshell, he’s an incredible artist who is the direct opposite of people like Damien Hirst or Jeff Koons. Keene makes a lot of art and sells it for next to nothing. Despite that, he is a good painter with a strong technique and a fine use of colour. I admire him. I hope he and the book continue to have success.

For more on the book, see Pitchfork. Image above is a link to a page from the book.

Three interiors of New York

Not sure what the purpose of this post is, other than offer up a snapshot of how people live in NYC in all extremes, from this 400-Square-Foot Brooklyn Studio  with a weird layout: 

To this somewhat bigger One-Bedroom in Brooklyn with a Smart Layout:

To this lifestyle of the rich and famous home of  director Paul Feig’s on Madison Avenue:

They are all very New York in their own way. Nothing is big though they try to look it. Brooklyn is now the place for the young to live: once affordable Manhattan rarely is. It’s all fascinating, at least to me.

P.S. Not NYC related, but I also found this fascinating: The dingy apartment of my 20s left an indelible mark on me. Many of us start out living not in places like above, but in crappy little dives. It leaves a mark on us and shapes us in a way. Recommended

On Basquiat’s notebooks

At the Brooklyn Museum they had an exhibit of Basquiat’s notebooks. They wrote:

A self-taught artist with encyclopedic and cross-cultural interests, Basquiat was influenced by comics, advertising, children’s sketches, Pop art, hip-hop, politics, and everyday life. Basquiat: The Unknown Notebooks emphasizes the distinct interplay of text and images in Basquiat’s art, providing unprecedented insight into the importance of writing in the artist’s process. The notebook pages on display contain early renderings of iconic imagery—tepees, crowns, skeleton-like figures, and grimacing faces—that also appear throughout his large-scale works, as well as an early drawing related to his series of works titled Famous Negro Athletes.

If you are a fan of the artist, I recommend you check this out: Brooklyn Museum: Basquiat: The Unknown Notebooks.

If you have someone who is interested in making their own art, encourage them to check it out too. Seeing Basquiat’s notebooks can remind them that even with humble materials, the potential to create something great exists.

It’s not that Brooklyn is getting more expensive: it’s that Manhattan is expanding. Why?

Home prices in some of the city’s neighborhoods have not just climbed over the last decade, they’ve blasted off, landed on Mars and found water.

Why? Well, look at where the growth is, and then look at this map of the NYC Subway:

More than other factors, the price of real estate seems  is tied to how easy it is to get back and forth from Manhattan.

That said, I’d be interested to know the story behind the areas of Manhattan that are stagnating.

NYC is never boring.

Source: New York Home Prices | New York Real Estate Price History

NYC has a good problem to have (some thoughts and observations)


New York City has a good problem to have: it’s getting increasingly more expensive to live there. In the second half of the 20th century, it had the opposite problem and the question was would anyone want to live in all but small parts of it. Those days are gone, so much so that Manhattan became too expensive for most, which partially led to people moving to Brooklyn. Now even Brooklyn is getting too expensive, according to this: Moving Out of Brooklyn Because of High Prices – NYTimes.com.

It’s not surprising to me: NYC is more desirable than ever to move to. Yet the parts of Manhattan and now Brooklyn that people find too pricey are not the whole city. I expect in a few years from now people will be talking about great spots in Queens and the Bronx and how they too are becoming more expensive.

Globally populations are leaving small towns and rural areas and moving to cities. Cities like New York will be the beneficiaries of this, and will grow accordingly.  Assuming they are well run cities, they will find ways to accomodate newcomers, and the parts that were cheaper will rise in value.

I don’t see NYC getting cheaper any time soon. It will be more what parts of it people live in, and what the housing will look like. I expect you will see more high rises built in places where none were before, and more and more neighborhoods being gentrified.

Here’s to a growing New York.

(Creative commons image from picsbyfreyja)