UPDATE: Apparently the Landmarks Preservation Commission has stepped in and asked the shop owner to comply with the approval process in this landmark building. The Mount Morris Park Historic District's newest shop has been getting a lot of negative attention for having a storefront incongruent with the landmark neighborhood and it appears that the city has stepped in as of last Friday. A reader sent in the lower photo today showing a stop work order on the wine and liquor store at the corner of 119th Street and Lenox and one can probably assume the action was taken after the local neighbors and community boards filed an extensive complaint early last week to city officials. There is no mention of the Landmark Preservation Commission but apparently some unsafe conditions were pointed out that has now stalled further progress on the controversial facade.
A group over there now milling about with a video camera and microphone.
ReplyDeleteBig fuss over not much if you ask me.
This liquor store was the lead article on dnaInfo this morning. According to one of the workers, they spent $4000 on that sign, which goes to show that bad taste can still be expensive.
ReplyDeleteIt's not the sign, it's the bulletproof glass and the message it sends. "Only criminals shop here and we're protecting ourselves". I will continue to travel over to 3rd Avenue and 119th where there is a new liquor and wine store that is totally open and allows customers to select their products. It's civilized and pleasant. NO reason the Lenox store could not be that way also.
ReplyDeleteI alway thought is was so sad in our communities the amount of Liquor stores and Funeral Homes that are everywhere...Imagine if there were a few alcohol and drug treatments centers around ! Then the first store wouldn't help lead you to the last !
ReplyDeleteThese glass coffins that these business have to sell there products is a sign to get into another business ! Lord !
well, that’s reasonable. You have choice. If people don’t want to go here they will go elsewhere and it will go out of business. But to deny this small business owner the opportunity to open because some don’t feel his shop is to their taste, that is wrong.
ReplyDeleteI can understand the signage issue. It is landmarked and that sign is clearly not in keeping with the guidelines, although neither are many other storefronts in the immediate area. But if the business owner feels he wants or needs bulletproof glass, that should be his decision. And if the owner of the building and/or the leasing agent failed to inform him of the restrictions regarding the sign they should be held accountable.
It would be a surprise to learn that someone would open up a liquor shop or any shop w/o checking out their competition - The Winery.....Harlem Vintage....with their tasteful and inviting interiors and free wine tastings. This new shop owner obviously hasn't spent much time around here.
ReplyDeleteCould not agree more - bullet proof glass is a turn off. Is there something about a liquor store than makes this glass necessary? The delis do not have them. I didn't see bullet proof glass at CVS when I was there last. Fine Fare allowed me to interact with the cashier with absolutely no protection. I was pretty happy about the liquor store, but this is rediq.
ReplyDeleteBut AFL--they are obviously going for a different clientele than the shops you mention. Not everyone wants free wine tasting. Some want a cheap pint. Nothing wrong with that. Look at the amount of Deals and Conway shopping bags you see on the street.
ReplyDeleteAnd Paul--yeah. There is something about liquor stores as opposed to a supermarket that calls for bulletproof glass--hostle drunks and cash money being just two.
Yeah, when you specialize in pints, you just might attract and get hostile drunks. Plenty of bulletproof pint joints in Harlem. A little variety might be nice and add to a continuing renaissance of Lenox Ave.
ReplyDeleteIt is hypocritical that Settepani across the street had to jump through hoops to ensure their awning was contextual while this is anything but contextual, not just the signage but the whole bullet proof liquor store itself along with the drunks and predictable public urination and other antisocial behavior the liquor store will bring to this beautiful avenue.
ReplyDeleteThe MMPCIA (Mount Morris Park Community Improvement Association) has worked tirelessly over the years to bring this neighborhood up, and have done an amazing job making MMP one of Harlem’s if not Manhattan’s most architecturally distinguished neighborhoods. It is good to see MMPCIA is opposing this liquor store and rightly so. The liquor store should have never have come this far and the owner either did not do his homework or was misled into thinking a bullet proof liquor store would not meet opposition.
ReplyDeleteSimple question then. Why would Settepani be made to jump through hoops to get approval and this seemingly went through without a hitch? Regardless of individual taste, rules need to be applied consistently across the board and it is obvious this one skipped most of them. Did somebody accept a little pocket money on the side? How else could it go through?
ReplyDelete@Chris. Because they just slapped it up before anyone noticed.
ReplyDeleteHa. Must have missed that part Sanou's Mum. I think with a somewhat quieter sign he might have got away with it and avoided all of the hassle! I agree that not everybody wants wine tasting events etc. A basic liquor store definitely does a job. The US version of an Off License Sanou's Mum?
ReplyDelete@Chris. I could use an Offie right this very minute.
ReplyDeleteToday’s DNA Info has a more balanced and less shrill NIMBY view of this whole brouhaha
ReplyDeleteThe most questionable liquor store I've been to is the one on 116 and ACP. Lots of characters at all hours, but the owners are great, and there's no bulletproof glass to be found. Just sayin...
ReplyDeleteSo what if a down-scale liquor store moves into the (their?) neighborhood. While they deride the cheap bodega, we still need places that sell the 50-cents cup of coffee, $3 wings and fries, the NY Beacon, Big Red and the Daily Challenge.
ReplyDeleteThe strength of Harlem for generations was the fact that our doctors lived next to our numbers runners and our elevator operators and our maids who lived with our schoolteachers who might’ve been our sister, daughter or mother. Some called it eclectic. We called it our extended family. We called this our community. We chose between the Flash Inn, the rib joints, Copeland’s, Barron’s Exclusive, the original Red Rooster, countless greasy spoon joints or M &G’s.
Now the New Harlemites want to make this their exclusive neighborhood that serves $4 lattes and hosts catered dinners while clucking their tongues at the homeless guy on the corner who used to be a tenant in their two-million-dollar brownstone.
PLEASE…..
Whose streets? Our streets -- where Black Jack and Janey knew everyone’s children and parents.
Whose brownstones? Well…. They may have bought (stolen) their historic brownstones from white-minded up-and-comers who think success means distancing yourself from people of your own hue and heritage. To bourgeois ex-Harlemites, sometimes it’s a mark of progress to move out their parents’ Harlem.
Historically, most Harlemites have been low-income tenants not owners of brownstones. Most Harlemites make less than $30,000 a year and cannot afford the wine-tastings and soirees that Ms. Richert and her cohorts idealize. Most Harlemites can no longer afford to live in Harlem. We need inexpensive stores that serve us, stores that we can afford to patronize. (BTW, Cheap hooch has always been part of the Harlem landscape.)
Money can never replace culture. Displace it yes, but never replace it.
Meanwhile, they play want a larger dog run in ‘Mount Morris Park‘ and never meet anyone on ‘Malcolm X Boulevard.’
Whose Harlem is it anyway?
They surely will have their own set of guns behind the counter. That worries me, not the ugly sign.
ReplyDeleteGood point, abelive.
ReplyDeleteWondering what's happening now? Walked by yesterday, and that contextually awful sign (I'm being nice, here) is still up.