The B Bar and Grill, formerly known as the Bowery Bar, was an early gentrifier on the old skid row, but the hot spot isn't taking too kindly to the newest kids on the block. The high-priced 2 Cooper Square tower across East 4th Street, a luxury rental rising 15 stories with a pool on top, is about to open with views directly down into the restaurant's prized courtyard. The B Bar crew, which includes Eric Goode, who helped push the gritty Bowery even further to the glam with his Bowery Hotel, set up camp here on the site of a dumpy gas station back in the mid-'90s. Back in those bad old Bowery days, the B Bar erected a cinder block wall along the sidewalk to keep the riffraff out (or in, depending on your opinion.) Now the restaurant wants even more privacy.
Earlier this summer more rows of cinder blocks facing East 4th Street went up in an attempt to keep prying eyes off the drinkers and diners partying under the downtown sky, even though we thought the Bowery was all about seeing and being seen these days. The Department of Buildings agrees with us, because along came an inspector who slapped the restaurant with a Stop Work Order. It's been decreed that the wall is too high and must be knocked down a peg or two. That leaves the B Bar unprotected from the neighborhood newcomers, but hopefully new and old along the Bowery can find a way to get along. Maybe over appletinis?
· 2 Cooper Square coverage [Curbed]
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