An off-off-Broadway hub for Puerto Rican artists whose East Village home was once considered off the beaten path is about to get a major mainstream makeover.
On Wednesday, the city will begin a $24 million, two-year renovation of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, a spoken-word performance space at 236 E. Third St. whose building was formerly an abandoned tenement.
The top-to-bottom revamp, which is being publicly funded through the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs, will add a second stage to the five-story building near Avenue C, as well as a rehearsal space, new lobby and elevator.
Overseen by the Department of Design and Construction, the project will preserve the tall brick-wall-lined main stage area, which was able to achieve its lofty height years ago with the removal of the building’s second floor.
However, the paintings that light up the building’s facade, including a portrait of poet and cafe co-founder Pedro Pietri and a soaring mural of the Puerto Rican flag, will disappear in the renovation, the first major one to happen since the cafe bought the foreclosed-upon site in 1981 for about $8,000, or $28,000 today.
Conceived in 1973 in the apartment of Miguel Algarin, an immigrant from Puerto Rico who sought to give voice to artists with backgrounds similar to his own—the term Nuyorican refers to New Yorkers of Puerto Rican descent—the cafe later relocated to a closed Irish bar on East Sixth Street before heading to East Third.
Like other buildings on the blocks east of Avenue A, No. 236 was abandoned in the 1960s in the face of white flight and rising crime. But the address embraced a new identity in the 1970s, when the La MaMa Experimental Theater Club, headed by producer Ellen Stewart, began hosting jazz shows in the building. Then, in 1977, city authorities seized the building for non-payment of taxes, according to the city register.
Nuyorican’s tenure in the space wasn’t entirely hiccup-free; the cafe closed for seven years in the 1980s. But by the time it reopened in 1989, its neighborhood seemed like a different place, and a new audience began flocking, especially for its poetry competitions, or “slams.” MTV even filmed a segment there in 1993.
During the current renovation, the cafe, which closed in November, will put on events in other venues around lower Manhattan.
Another sign of the area’s gentrification is just next door. A series of avant-garde theaters occupied the low brick building there in the 1960s and 1970s, including the New Federal Theater, a venue that showcased African-American playwrights that is now in Times Square.
But after being shuttered for fire-code violations in the 1980s after a stint as a nightclub, the structure was bulldozed a few years ago and replaced by a luxury condo, Novum East Village, a seven-story, 20-unit offering with a dark-hued facade.
Developer Gary Vinbaytel purchased the site, 238 E. Third St., in 2018 for $12 million and expects a sell-out of $37 million, according to the condo’s offering plan.
C. J. Hughes , 2024-03-29 18:34:39
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