At long last, L.A. Burdick Chocolate is returning to the City they love! In late October, L.A. Burdick Café (5 East 20th Street, 212 796-0143) opened featuring their award winning hot chocolate and renowned chocolate mice and bonbons. The café is open seven days a week serving hot and cold drinks, homemade pastries and a full selection of chocolates.
This quarter, a new wave of sit-down restaurants and bars opened in Union Square, doubling the openings in this category for 2024 year-to-date compared to the same period last year. Notable newcomers include jazz club and Japanese whiskey bar Midnight Blue, from the team behind top cocktail bars Martiny’s and L’Americana, and Amo Seafood, a new favorite for Italian coastal cuisine. 17th Street has blossomed into a culinary destination. The newest arrivals are the highly acclaimed Peruvian restaurant Mission Ceviche and the Vietnamese gem
La Dong, which join the notable 2024 arrival Kanyakumari. Alongside beloved staples Lillie’s, Pasta Eater, and Laut, this vibrant street is your go-to spot for an unforgettable meal.
Cava Grill, which specializes in Mediterranean dips and spreads, will open on 4th Ave. near 13th St. soon. In the meantime, you can sample their recipes at Whole Foods.
As construction for the Union Square tech hub begins, Greenwich Village preservationists have resurrected their call for the city to designate a new historic district in the area, AM New York first reported.
Last October, following a contested upzoning of a lot on 14th Street to build the 21-story training center, the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation (GVSHP) asked the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) to consider designating a new historic district to protect 193 buildings in the area.
Over the summer, the LPC moved to designate seven of those buildings, but rejected the call for a full historic district. At the time, the LPC said that the area mostly contains buildings erected between the 1830s and 1930s, as well as new and altered ones, and that because of their variety in styles, types, and dates, “[the area] lacks the consistent architectural quality, cohesiveness, and sense of place necessary to merit historic district designation.”
But GVSHP is persistent, and this week resurrected its call for a proper district protecting more buildings in the area. In a letter sent to LPC this week, the group made the case for protecting 10 buildings, including 10 East 14th Street, a cast-iron structure that once housed the NYC Woman Suffrage League headquarters; 72 Fifth Avenue, a masonry structure that was the headquarters of Appleton & Company; and 17 East 13th Street, the brick Erskine Press building. The selection of buildings also includes structures associated with 19th-century architect James Renwick Jr.
“[These buildings] speak to the incredibly rich and important social and architectural history of the area, and to New York’s development as the capital of commerce and culture in the late 19th and 20th centuries,” the letter from GVSHP reads.
“With increased pressure on the area from the beginning of construction on the 14th Street Tech Hub, the recent loss of Renwick’s St. Denis Hotel (1855), and the completion of the woefully out of scale tech office tower at 808 Broadway, the time for the city to act is now,” Andrew Berman, executive director of GVSHP, told Curbed in a statement.
The group is also pushing for city lawmakers to implement protections that would regulate commercial development south of 14th Street through a “protective zoning measure,” which was promised at the time of the tech hub rezoning over a year ago.
City Council member Carlina Rivera, who represents the area, negotiated those commitments from the de Blasio administration, but advocates have said those promises hadn’t materialized.
“Councilwoman Rivera continues to work with the community to ensure the history of the Village is preserved and she is meeting regularly with LPC to discuss future protections for her entire district that should be considered,” Jeremy Unger, a spokesperson for Rivera, said in a statement.
Due to an increasing number of thefts of UPS packages which are left unattended by the UPS delivery man outside shareholders’ doors, the procedure will now change. UPS will no longer leave packages unattended upstairs. Instead, he will place them behind the locked door off the lobby, to which he and Niall will have a key. A notification of package arrival will be on the bulletin board. You can then get in touch with Niall to get the package.
Please address any questions to Niall.
UNION SQUARE—Starting today, sandwich shop Num Pang is serving snow cones. Choose from Lime Lemongrass topped with Lychee and Pineapple Ginger topped with Toasted Coconut.
12th St. West of University
