P.F. Chang’s Finally Opens, But……

Every Thursday at 9AM from June 18 until August 13 you can join Brooklyn Bridge Boot Camp at the south end of Union Square for a free cardio workout. Feel the burn.

From the Times:
The countdown has begun to the closing of the 16th Street space that this influential restaurant has occupied for 30 years. The cafe, which was the first piece of Danny Meyer’s culinary empire, has been a favorite of New York’s publishing world and jump-started the renaissance of the Union Square area. But it will not renew its lease at a higher rent, and in the spring will relocate to nearby 235 Park Avenue South, at East 19th Street.

To mark the final days at its current spot, from Dec. 1 to 12, the last day of service, the restaurant will switch to a three-course dinner menu called the 12 Nights of Union Square Cafe, highlighting some of its best-known seasonal dishes, including garganelli with white truffles, beef tartare, lamb braciole and Berkshire rack of pork. There are optional wine pairings from some of the restaurant’s favorite producers. Lunches will feature the regular à la carte menu:

Dinner reservations Dec. 1 to 12 by phone only, $85 prepaid; lunch reservations up to 28 days ahead, opentable.com;

Union Square Cafe, 21 East 16th Street, 212-243-4020,

unionsquarecafe.com.

Next week (June 18 to June 22), Mechanical equipment and work will continue at the 17th and 18th floor levels. The superstructure concrete work will be completed on the building by the end of the month. Deliveries for the internal systems of the building have been ongoing and will continue, although they should not greatly affect the flow of pedestrian and road traffic. The crane on site is scheduled for demobilization on Saturday, the 25th.

The following week (June 25 to June 29), we will be working on the machine room levels on the 17th and 18th floors. Deliveries for the internal systems of the building have been ongoing and will continue, although they should not greatly affect the flow of pedestrian and road traffic.

This weekend the site will be open on Saturday, June 16th for superstructure related activities between the work hours of 7AM and 5PM as permitted by the City. To control noise levels within the site, work activities will be limited to working on the mechanical systems of the building and using the crane and equipment to support activities. Safety horns are used, and required by law, to coordinate lifting with the crane and to alert the workers of the danger overhead. We have directed the operators to limit the use of horns to one short sounding and to use the crane later in the day so as to avoid any excess noise.

The downtown location of popular vegan restaurant Blossom is out after two years. The team announced the closure of their University Place outpost in an Instagram post, saying that they were “grateful for the chance to focus our energies and resources on our flagship Upper West Side location.”

When the New School builds its new building on the corner, one of its major uses will be to house a consolidated Parsons School of Fashion Design, which is currently scattered among many midtown buildings. That’s according to the New School student newspaper. So expect even more groovily dressed teens outside our front doors.

In case you haven’t seen the renderings for 15 Union Square West, here they are. And here’s one $4,100,000 listing. The interesting thing about this development is that it retains the original cast-iron window frames from the 19th-century while wrapping the whole thing in 21st-century glass. Take a close look when you walk by. And here’s the history of the building.  And a recent New York Times peek inside the model apartment.