Summer in the Square: The Schedule

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Exciting new for the neighborhood that proves that the 14th St. shareholders live in an important building: our neighbor at number 22, namely the Duane Reade building, has been landmarked by the city for its historical significance. This action protects it in perpetuity. The Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation gives us this historical background:

“The Baumann Brothers Furniture and Carpets Store was built in 1880-81 for James McCreery (1826- 1903), a well-known textiles merchant of Scottish descent. It was designed by the architectural firm of D. & J. Jardine, whose principals, David and John Jardine, were brothers also of Scottish birth. One of the more prominent, prolific, and versatile New York firms in the late-nineteenth century, D. & J. Jardine executed designs for a wide variety of building types, including a number of notable cast-iron fronts, in contemporary styles. The wide cast-iron front facade of the Baumann Brothers store is one of the firm’s and one of the city’s most inventive, unusual, and ornamental. Built toward the end of the heyday of cast-iron fronts in New York and the flourishing creativity in that material, the Baumann Brothers store is also a signal achievement of Aesthetic Movement design. An amalgam of ornamental influences, including neo-Classical, neo-Grec, and Queen Anne styles, is embraced to achieve a decorative overall composition. Another designed, though simpler, facade on 13th Street is clad in brick and stone with a cast-iron ground story. The building’s prime location was in the midst of Manhattan’s primary retail shopping district, which included 14th Street, Union Square, and Ladies’ Mile. From 1881 to 1897, it housed Baumann Brothers, a furniture-manufacturing company established c. 1870 by Albert and Ludwig Baumann, Bohemian Jewish immigrants. By 1884, the firm occupied the entire structure and billed itself as “the largest and most complete furnishing establishment in America.” A painted sign advertising Baumann Brothers is still visible on the building’s western wall. For eight decades, the ground story contained 5-10-and-25-cent stores, beginning with the fourth Woolworth store in Manhattan (1900-28), acclaimed at its opening “the largest ten-cent store in the world.” This space was later a store for F. & W. Grand, H.L. Green, and McCrory. The upper stories were leased for over eight decades for show rooms and manufacturing by various firms related to the textile and sporting goods industries, as well as a gymnasium and classrooms for the Delehanty Institute (1930-63), which trained candidates of the Police and Fire Departments. The building currently contains a drugstore, while the upper stories are used as an annex to the Parsons School of Design.”

The Hell’s Kitchen restaurant Taboon, which has charmed diners since 2004 with its breads, pizzas and small plates, will soon offer a taste of the Middle East to the NYU crowd.

The owners of the eatery on 10th Avenue and 52nd Street will open a still-unnamed “quick-service” Mediterranean joint at 30 E. 13th St. within the next two months, the realtor for the space announced this week.

The 1,000-square-foot space previously held the Korean restaurant DoSirak, which moved across the street in September and changed its name to BAK Korean Kitchen & Craft Beer Hall.

Fans of Taboon, which New York Times food critic Frank Bruni said put “a deft, sophisticated spin on Middle Eastern food,” will find its new sister restaurant has a similar atmosphere, Kelly Gedinsky of Winick Realty Group LLC said in a statement.

Next week (November 19 to November 23), Material and equipment deliveries and installation work will continue on all floors. Curtain wall installation on the lower floors along 14th st. has been completed and the crane has left the job. The site will be closed on the 22nd for the holiday but will be open Friday the 23rd and Saturday the 24th.

The following week (November 26 to November 30) Material and equipment deliveries and installation work will continue on all floors.

This weekend the site will be open on Saturday, November 17th for interior related activities between the work hours of 7AM and 5PM as permitted by the City. Con Ed will be working in the street.

Here’s one problem we haven’t had in our bulding (yet): a bee swarm. Bee experts had to be called in last week to collect a swarm of bees at 4th Ave. and 14th. St. Weird.