Life in and around Hell’s Kitchen, NYC
If you thought Gotham West Market was daunting, then this will absolutely frighten you. The NY Post reports (yeah, I know…) that Treehaus – a new farm-to-table market/restaurant mix which opened last year on Third Ave – has signed on to open their second location at MiMA on W 42nd, which will be 40% bigger than GWM.
Here’s what the current location looks like, which is probably the kind of thing we’ll end up with:
Per the article:
It will be open 24 hours daily, offering casual menus for sit-down customers and catering and delivery for MiMA residents.
It promises “American cuisine with a French twist” at indoor and outdoor seating, as well as beer and wine tastings from local microbreweries and wineries “accompanied by cheeses and small homemade organic food items inspired by the popular Smorgasburg Flea Food Market in Williamsburg and DUMBO.”
No word on when we can expect an opening, but the action is definitely heating up in the megadevelopment-food-market department.
It seems like all we ever hear about is new restaurants and bars, each more pricey than the last, and always on 9th and 10th Aves, so it’s a refreshing change that a new hardware store is coming, and on 11th Ave. United Hardware are preparing to open at 51st & 11th, just south of The Daily Show studio.
They’ve had plywood up for a while now (with the fanciest temporary door ever):
It’s such a nice change of pace over on that part of 11th. Developers have their work cut out for them when they inevitably set their sights on it.
It’s almost here. The second outpost of Turco II, which we’ve been watching for months, is gearing up for its opening. The signage was completed recently, bringing the construction of the new spot much closer to an end.
Over the (long) weekend crews were continuing on the store:
Residents above 46th St can start getting excited for a two-block-closer gyro fix.
The massive Verizon building at 435 W 50th St is getting the condo treatment. Developers JDS and Property Markets Group are converting the building – which dates back to 1927 – into 51 condos ranging from $1.5 million right up to $9 million. Madness.
The future:
The development will be going by the name Stella Tower. Fortunately, it looks like they’re staying pretty true to the original design, which is more than you can say for some other developments going up around the area.
The building is currently drowning in scaffolding while the conversion gets underway:
All the scaffolding makes for a really great skyline:
Here’s the spiel on the mostly uninformative website:
Designed in 1927 by pre-eminent architect Ralph Walker, Stella Tower has been transformed into 51 of the finest condominium residences, capturing the best of a pre-war architectural masterpiece and modern living. Located in the iconic New York neighborhood of Hell’s Kitchen, Stella Tower shines as a new beacon, rising above its skyline neighbors, showcasing dramatic 360-degree views of Manhattan.
And then there’s this line:
A new star is born
A quick progress on the clearing out of the closed Go Sushi. The plywood went up over the past week, and now the very recognizable neons have been taken down:
Last we heard the plan was for this place to become the new home of next-door-neighbor Vynl, moving into the coveted corner spot. Guess we’ll find out when we manage to get a look behind the plywood.
Work is steadily progressing at the incoming BarBacon on 9th Ave, with the rebuilding of the interior of the former café surging ahead. They’ve been putting up plenty of updates on the progress on their Facebook page:
BarBacon is taking over the former home of Brasilina Café on 9th Ave between 54th & 55th. We’ve simmered a bit since our previous coverage of the incoming place, hopefully it ends up being classier than its name leads us to believe. Either way though, bacon-lovers are sure to flock to the place, so it should end up being quite popular.
A quick heads up: it’s been announced that the incoming Kiehl’s on 9th Ave will be opening its doors for the first time this Friday the 29th, which will bring our non-stop coverage of the place to an end. You may have noticed the new signage went up last week in preparation:
No word on any Black Friday deals…
Update: Puff Cha opened on Christmas day, so you can head in now for your curry puff fix.
It’s winter, so the only way to lure us outside is with hot food. With that in mind, Puff Cha is gearing up to open in a small space near the corner of 50th & 10th, and will bring tea, coffee, and pastries, along with curry puffs.
The street signage is looking a bit more toned down than this rendering they posted at the end of August:
Construction at the place has been ongoing for months, and they seemed to indicate they were going to be opening earlier this month, but it looks like they’ve been delayed. The place should be open soon though – there’s still another week of November – so you’ll be able to try out “the South Asian equivalent of an empanada” in no time.
The new Kiehl’s store coming to 9th Ave is still moving along. Over the week the plywood – which went up just over a month ago – came down, revealing not a whole lot from the outside:
This is a pretty good sign that construction is wrapping up at the spot, so look forward to the beauty products store opening soon.
The incoming second outpost of Turco has run into some trouble, being hit with a stop work order for expired permits.
So far things have been moving pretty quickly with the construction (too quickly to renew permits, I guess…). We’ll have to see if they keep the momentum going once they get past this issue.
Update: The day we post this, the notices get taken down. I guess it’s all back to normal at Turco II then.
The signage for the return of Golden Chicken & Ribs is up, and it’s a bit fancy. The neons behind the shiny letters cycle colors:
Still no word on an opening date, but things are moving along quickly.
If you haven’t seen the posters all over the place, the future development 540 West has come out of hiding over the past few weeks and begun its marketing push. Here’s what we can look forward to around this time in 2014:
(Head over to their site for more renderings)
The development will consist of two buildings – each seven stories high – with a total of 114 condos. Most importantly though, they’ll bring “edgy innovative luxury” to “HLSKTCHN” (they’re too edgy and innovative for vowels, it seems):
The development will be taking over a full strip between 48th & 49th, between 10th & 11th. Here’s the site at the moment:
Behind the plywood, crews were working away in the pit over the weekend:
Not wasting any time, the sales center is set up just around the corner from the construction site on 10th Ave, so you can head in to find out more about this exctng dvlpmnt.
It looks like the new tenants for the former site of Kiran Indian on W 53rd St are getting ready. This evening a few people were checking out the (still partially furnished) spot, assumedly representing the future tenant Co Ba, a Vietnamese restaurant in Chelsea who look to be expanding north.
The liquor license application hearing was tonight, so the people would’ve come straight from that. With any luck they’ll be up and running by Christmas so they can make the most of the lights.
Way back in June of this year, we spotted plans for a new hotel coming to W 35th St. The InterContinental Group’s new brand EVEN Hotels are opening the second location of their chain here, because as we know there’s a desperate need for more hotels in the area… Anyway, thanks to the new-ish law making posting them mandatory, here’s the rendering:
So modern.
Here’s what the site looks like at the moment (and don’t worry, we’ve gotten the right image this time):
For reference, here’s the now-demolished previous building:
To recap the previous post, the new hotel will be 25 stories tall, and was scheduled to open around mid-2015. You just know the “around the corner from Times Square!” ads are being written already.
Update: Here’s the actual construction site at the moment:
