2009
The building was sold and sold again. Recently, the plywood was removed to reveal this--a stark white box awaiting a luxury chain store or an art gallery or a restaurant. Certainly not a rag-tag, affordable opera house.
As Bowery Boogie noted last year, infamous local landlord Steve Croman was "converting 319 Bowery into a mixed-use dwelling befitting Bowery 2.0. Three glitzy, full-floor apartments, including the aforementioned penthouse will sit atop the ground level store. The retail space was last on the market in 2014, asking a whopping $35,000 per month in rent."
Actually, it's better to think of this as Bowery 3.0. The first was a high-rent district that declined over time, especially when the el went in.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowery#Rise_of_the_area
Not that that makes the current transformation any better.
Is this the small opera house that was featured on 60 Minutes? I suspect the original owner may have passed. I don't know why but I just fell in love with the idea of having a small opera house for professional as well as amateur and student performers. Just like in Italy and Sicily, these small theaters are just wonderful to experience. If I ever hit the lottery I will definitely fund one in my home town! So sad to see that it appears to have taken a final bow.
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