Astor Place Hair Gets Sheared

Now that Joseph has left Astor Place Hair the end must be near.

Dr. Mike and his son have moved to 100 Chruch Street between Park Place and Murray Street. I tripped over him on a recent NYC jaunt and found his lofty reputation well-deserved. Best haircut ever, and $20 with tip. On a Sunday, even!

Dr. Mike didn't retire, he opened up his own location elsewhere.

Cold Stone Creamery is really good. Except for that creepy singing thing they do. I hope that it doesn't affect the work of the barbers downstairs. Or that they don't start singing too. Yikes.

Just noticed Dr. Mike is no longer at Astor. Jay said he retired.

Whoa...I never knew about Astor Place Haircuts moving out of the groundfloor location. But, a Cold Stone Creamery is gonna move in??? WHAT!? Even though I hear its great ice cream, but I think its just as bad as if another starbucks moved in.

The gentrification of the area is making me think "what the hell is going on?" The East Village is a rather unique place in the city and its become home to corporate blandess....

And, Panya Bakery always brings in heaploads of business even though it's located right near 2 out of the 4 Starbucks in the area. Their coffee is so much better than Starbucks too and cheaper. That and they have a huuge selection of wonderful patries and sandwiches.

SP has it right. Take a look at Fortune magazine's article a few months back about Wal-Mart, and how they're driving companies which can't meet their low price-points out of business.

Yes, if people were to stop going to Starbucks and etc. then they would close down. But apart from it being hard to ignore the lower prices, there is what has made McD's so successful: the food sucks and is unhealthy, but you know exactly what you're getting. Every chain store is similar to every other, there is no mystery or confusion or embarassment.

If you think the mallification of New York is bad, venture outside of the city sometime. It is frightening. The suburbs are supposed to be where you go it you're frightened; I find them frightening in and of themselves.

Some things are paying a little extra to preserve. But I forgot, we're all republicians now, taxes and government regulation and social engineering are bad. Right? All bow to Efficiency.

I want a little chaos. From mutated madness do societies evolve.

We lose the Astor Place Hair window for another chain store with a "homey" image. Synthetic-ass shit.

I've been going to Astor for about years, and I've never been upstairs. It's not so much a loss, really. I didn't think you really felt like you were getting the full experience unless you stared across the expanse of the basement and it took a moment for you to realize there were dozens of people being serviced at the moment. But it has struck me as a little slower over the past two years. So do yerself a cheap favor. Go see Ireena, the only person to cut my hair since 1993.

the reason why stores like starbucks, home despot, barnes and noble, and wal mart are killing off small "mom and pop" owned stores is because they can buy in much larger volumes, put pressure on their suppliers to give them large volume discounts, and effectively cut the bottom out of the market making it impossible for an individual to compete. add to that greedy landlords and politicians on the take, multi million dollar ad campaigns to brainwash you into thinking you are getting better products / services, and voila, corporate homogeneity instilled into our culture, and the recipy for a doomed society.

I live in Inwood, too, and it's only a matter of time before one opens up here. There's one at 181st and as more young (and mainly white) people move into Inwood and rents go up, then someone will realize a Starbucks could do okay. I have conflicting feelings about this because I feel I'm probably part of the gentrification. But then on the other hand, I'm a starving photographer, and it's one of the few areas I can afford. (Full disclosure: I generally avoid Starbucks, but come summer time, I can't say no to a Frappaccino. Sigh).

Let me just sing the praises of the Mud truck for a moment. This renovated, orange Con Ed truck situates itself smack btwn two Starbucks, and the husband-and-wife owners have a biz that continues to thrive... now they have more orange trucks and a 9th street store across the street from, yup, another Starbucks... Yay Mud truck! It just might be the only example of the little guy taking on, and existing despite, the big guy. (Plus their coffee is twice as good and half as expensive)

Let me just sing the praises of the Mud truck for a moment. This renovated, orange Con Ed truck situates itself smack btwn two Starbucks, and the husband-and-wife owners have a biz that continues to thrive... now they have more orange trucks and a 9th street store across the street from, yup, another Starbucks... Yay Mud truck! It just might be the only example of the little guy taking on, and existing despite, the big guy. (Plus their coffee is twice as good and half as expensive)

my recommendation for the best haircut downtown: the hair box on spring street just off sullivan- a real authentic new york haircut with hot shaving cream and straight razors and everything. i've probably gotten my hair cut at astor 200 times- but once i discovered the hair box, i've never gone back.

Since I live in upper Manhattan, I'm mostly immune to the mall-ification, but it is sad that more chains and less unique stores are moving in. Alarmingly, though, a real estate broker indicated to me last week that the arrival of a Starbucks is a sign that a neighborhood is flourishing. I don't know what that says about Inwood, since we don't have one yet. I suspect that there is a direct relationship between the number of Starbucks(es?) in a neighborhood and the average rent.

I remember Theatre 80 and still have one of their umbrellas. I used to park my bike in the "bike area" to the right of the box office. Last saw Bang The Drum Slowly and Mean Streets double bill late 80's. Part of it's charm was yelling focus. And Jen with all due respect you can tell clients to meet anywhere

in the Village without patronizing, promoting a part of the problem, Starbucks. It's not exactly a tough place to get around... I curse the day Kmart moved in and The Gap replaced The St. Marks Cinema. Hello Taxi Driver at midnight with anyone sporting a hawk getting in free! and Blade Runner every Tuesday night at midnight.

I believe that it's possible to like different retail stores and service locations that happen to be a mix of corporate and non-corporate. You can indeed enjoy Starbucks and Astor Place Hair at the same time. You can root for both of them, and you can lament it if either one of them begin scaling back (or closing altogether).

Sure, it's not the best thing in the world if all the mom-and-pop shops close in the face of bland corporate megastores and chain outlets, but let's face it; that only happens when everyone starts to shop at the corporate stores. In the case of Home Depot and Wal-Mart (ick!), it's cheaper goods. In the case of Starbucks, it's something about the store and the products that seems appealing (it's certainly NOT the price). Either way, they never stopped anyone from shopping at the privately owned stores. It's just that more people started choosing the corporate stores.

I know a lot of free-thinking people don't care for the corporate stores too much, but do we know why they're more successful? Can we bring that kind of thinking to the privately owned stores that we like so much, in the hope of keeping some of them around? (Note: some of them probably are on the verge of closing in the face of ANY competition; rather, focus on the healthy ones that have a chance of thriving throughout the years with the right strategy)

dirk, if people would stop going to starbucks, then they wouldn't expand, would they? there would be no need to increase the number of retail outlets if suddenly their same store sales went plunging. but if sales keep going up and the stores are doing well, the marketplace is going to yield to the places that can pay the rents.

sadly, that's going to mean more starbucks locations and less mom and pop shops.

I have fond memories of Astor Place Haircuts, where I got my hair cut in high school ($8 a cut back then). I'm glad they're just paring back, not going out of business. At the same time, I'm not one of those anti-chain-store absolutists. Some chain stores I quite like. But my wife and I also bought a house in the suburbs rather than sacrifice our financial security on the altar of New York cool by renting for the rest of our lives, so you'll probably consider me an irrelevant traitor.

My bad, you're right it's not closing. But it's only a matter of time now before it does close completely, considering the speed of the mall-ification of Manhattan. I really don't have anything against Starbucks -- but four stores in one area is pure greed and only serves to quicken the gentrification and raise rents. I see nothing positive about that.

Astor Place Haircuts is not closing - it's simply reducing its space by 10%. And while the Starbucksing of NYC is not that great, the multiple Starbucks locations enabled us to tell business colleagues to "meet us at Starbucks" and have them be confused and we would be able to hide out near St Marks Church.

$100,000/yr for a 1000 sq ft storefront on Astor Place and Broadway? That's much less than I would have expected - that neighborhood probably fetches AT LEAST $200/sq ft for ground level retail space.

Since I followed Shorty to his new job, I have not been to Astor in a couple years. But it's sad to see them shrink.

Yes, that whole area is getting completely mall-ified. Have you seen St. Marks between 2nd and 3rd? I lost Religious Sex, and some CD places. Now there's all these chain fastfood places. And Starbucks, fuck them.

Oh Real New Yorker, you are bringing tears to my eyes.

What I wouldn't give to sit at the Astor Riviera with my little sister and have a burger with fries and blue cheese on the side.

And to change into wacky pleather clothes in the bathroom...then to hang out all night at Boy Bar, or maybe catch a movie at THEATRE 80. do you remember theatre 80, under the direction of harrold ottway, where crazy people would go to see double features of real classics and shout "focus" twice?

I can't even go there in my mind, so happy, yet painful to see what has been lost to the corporate chain stores.

Dr. Mike is cool, but I go to his brother, Jay for a purofessional haircut every time.

It's unfortunate, but it's not a huge deal though, I first heard that they were closing the storefront before New Years. It's a bit more crowded downstairs, but it's the same really. Who got their haircut upstairs anyway?

Just don't replace Dr. Mike, the Orthodox Russian surgeon who came to America over 30 years ago and has a doctorate in hairology. Another satisfied customer!

My big brother took me to Astor Place in 1983.

We took the subway from far away Queens.

I walked up 8th street from 6th avenue with him, marveling at the stores. Butterfly for Joy Division posters, the upstairs Rock and Roll shop for import picture vinyl records from Britain, Flip the clothing store with Pepe jeans and safety pin shirts, Patricia Fields and Eva's veggie hippie restaurant.

I had long asian girl hair in a bad perm.

Astor Place was still only one floor and it was not besotted with its own glamour yet. It still looked and felt like an old world barber shop.

We went to Vito and I got a "new wave" haircut, like veronica lake with a buzzer.

I went back to school on Monday, and I became popular and a pariah, all at once,

A nerdy boy had a crush on me, but before I would date him, I made him get a haircut at Astor Place.

He got a haircut that made him look like he belonged on the 1918 Princeton swim team.

I stopped going to Astor Place in college, when all Vito wanted to do was feel me up.

Another nail in the coffin of the Village. What a surprise... No one to blame but the new breed of midwest New Yorker who patronizes this crap. How many of you even remember when the Astor Riviera was the late night hang after 4am? The St. Marks Cinema? When Sounds had a store around the block... When chain stores were nowhere to be found? When mom and pop stores were the norm... This is disgusting.

There's in big contradition in Gothamist lamenting the closing of Astor Place Haircuts and at the same time saying that four Starbucks within three blocks is one of reasons you were fond of the area.

the cooper union site is cooper.edu

This is a shame. It's a real New York landmark and now it's being replaced by something you can get anywhere in the country. The mall-ification of SoHo and the Village continues. A large ice cream at Cold Stone will cost as much as a kids cut at Astor Place.

Are they going to lay off any of their barbers? With less space how will they all fit in the basement?