Bowery Street

Neighborhood groups in the Bowery are pushing city officials to impose height restrictions on new developments on the street’s east side, and their campaign is increasingly gathering steam, the New York Observer reported.

In order to preserve the character and visual makeup of the area, the groups aim to cap building height to 85 feet on the eastern side of the street, akin to the restrictions that are already in place on the western side. “To do justice to the Bowery, you really need to do justice to both sides of the street,” Kerri Culhane, an architectural historian and the associate director of Two Bridges Neighborhood Council, told the Observer. “I think the planning commission at this point has not considered the Bowery as a whole.” [more]

The interior of an Intermix store

In what some would call a final blow to the Bowery, trendy fashion retailer Intermix will move to the street, Bowery Boogie reported.

The designer clothing purveyor will join other recent higher-end additions to neighborhood, such as Anthropologie and Patagonia, that have furthered the gentrification of the once-gritty strip, Bowery Boogie points out. [more]

The Bowery has been included in the State Register of Historic Places, DNAinfo reported, giving support to neighborhood groups who seek the street’s inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places.

But unlike historic districts in the city, the designation carries no weight in protecting buildings from alteration.

“The Bowery nomination is unique — it not only recognizes the architecture and cultural history of the street, but it acknowledges the earliest planning history of New York,” historian Kerri Culhane, who wrote the Bowery’s 171-page nomination, said in a statement.

“By extension, the Bowery nomination should be used as a planning tool to help guide better planning, zoning… on this vibrant and dynamic thoroughfare, which continues to make history today.” … [more]

Once known as the “lighting district,” the stretch of Bowery south of Houston Street is losing the shops that contibruted to that nickname. The Wall Street Journal reported that since 2000 the area has dropped one-third of its light fixture businesses — bringing the total to 20, and two more are set to close — while rents have more than doubled from between $30 to $50 per square foot to about $100 in 2011.

Like similar “districts” on the Lower East Side, including the restaurant supply businesses that lined the sidewalks between East Houston and Delancey streets, glassy new development has pushed out iconic shopping areas. And at the market’s peak many developers simply made offers to acquire real estate that lighting store owners couldn’t refuse…. [more]

The new Wyndham Garden Hotel

The 18-story Wyndham Garden Hotel is approaching completion at the intersection of the Bowery and Hester Street in Chinatown. Though the structure is already topped out and much of the glazing is in place, the renderings give a clearer idea of how it would ideally look, and that is none too promising.

The base of the building, at 91-93 Bowery Street, glazed and framed with masonry, occupies its lot completely. But then the structure rises up as a series of modest setbacks away from the Bowery and culminate in a fairly unimaginative summit defined by two balconies on different levels, as well as a sequence of columns, all cast in a stridently modernist idiom. This summit in turn is capped by a masonry-clad mechanical core.
… [more]

Despite meeting with preservation advocates April 12 to hear concerns about redevelopment, Arun Bhatia, the new owner of 35 Cooper Square, a centuries-old property near the corner of East 6th Street, has decided not to preserve the structure, according to DNAinfo.

Bhatia bought the three-story 1825 village rowhouse late last year for $8.5 million and submitted an application for demolition in March, angering neighbors and inspiring a campaign against the destruction led by the Bowery Alliance of Neighbors…. [more]

Paris-based Louzon Group has officially completed its purchase of the old Salvation Army Residence at 347-349 Bowery for $7.6 million, Eastern Consolidated announced. The Louzon Group will now go ahead with its plans to replace the vacant three-story building with a 72-room boutique hotel and restaurant, designed by architect Gene Kaufman, who just unveiled a rendering of the building. In 2009, the building was targeted for conversion into a high-end sushi restaurant and nightclub, but those plans got derailed over community complaints. [Curbed] … [more]

The former site of a Salvation Army shelter at 347-349 Bowery is slated
to become a 65-room boutique hotel and restaurant. According to the
Post, the Paris-based Louzon Group has purchased the corner building at
East 4th Street for $6.7 million, tapping Gene Kaufman as the architect. The building, which is now vacant, was targeted for conversion into a
high-end sushi restaurant and nightclub in 2009, but those plans got
derailed over community complaints, Curbed reported…. [more]

Residents of the Whitehouse hotel were slated to go to housing court yet again today, according to a Curbed tipster. Longtime tenants are taking buyouts, and the remaining residents are heading to court, and, in what seems to be a regular occurrence, meeting with representatives from the Cooper Square Committee and Manhattan Legal Services. Hotel developer Sam Chang has been eyeing the decrepit building, which used to be known as the Bowery. [Curbed]

The Boutiques on Bowery is coming to the ground-floor retail space at
the 15-story condominium 52 East 4th Street on Feb. 1. The flea-market
type shop is currently looking for new designers to fill 36 booths in
the space and will replace the seasonal Bowery Bazaar, which opened
temporarily in November. According to the Boutiques on Bowery Web site,
the Boutiques on Bowery will feature various new designers selling
women’s clothing, dresses, sweaters, men’s suits, hats, scarves and
vintage jewelry. It will also include a Brazilian coffee shop called
O-Cafe coffee bar. [EV Grieve]
… [more]