Oh Grimaldi's, Grimaldi's, Grimaldi's. As if the famed pizzeria didn't have enough on its plate with the rent dispute at its DUMBO home, a judge has ordered the pizzeria to cough up $2.3 million for defaulting on a 15 year lease for a space at 135 John St. Whoops! Meanwhile the restaurant's much-delayed 24-hour location in the old Limelight has no opening in sight. When we called the mothership to ask about its opening we got the honest-sounding reply: "we have no idea."
Grimaldi's Owes Millions For Not Opening Manhattan Space
Limelight Marketplace Opens This Friday
The 163-year-old church that formerly housed the Limelight will now be known as the Limelight Marketplace. Times they are a changin'. The mini mall opens this Friday at 2 p.m.—it boasts 20,000-square-feet and 60 shops, cafes and food concessions throughout multiple levels (here's a sneak peek at what's inside). Get ready to party... right? Just leave your glow sticks and blow at home.
Inside the Limelight Marketplace
While it may not be opening until the Spring of next year, the Limelight Marketplace invited us over today to take a look at the space as it transforms yet again. Photographer Katie Sokoler reports back that, "although it's just a bunch of mini stores, they don't want to be known as a mini mall! It's a market." The folks there also told her that it would be very family friendly (but no club kids), and "Saturdays it will feel like a carnival because they'll have clowns and mascots walking around." Terrifying!
Limelight Marketplace Readies to Open
The people behind the Limelight Marketplace have released renderings of their future mall. They tell us "the storied 163-year-old venue in Manhattan’s Flatiron district is being transformed into a three-story shopper’s paradise." When it opens, expect to see jewelry, organic groceries, candy, art, home decor, a salon and a sneaker shop. Do not expect to see club kids, trannies and cocaine-coated floorboards.
Neighbors Sense Something Shady About New Limelight
The business group spearheading what they hope to be the next era of the Limelight—retail—presented its plans to a local community board this week and were met with a great deal of skepticism and suspicion. The Limelight Marketplace group is hoping to put a mini-mall into the onetime church whose eye-catching building along Sixth Avenue in the Chelsea is only eclipsed by the stories of the drug-fueled and freak-filled nights that went on inside its walls during its era as one of clubland meccas of the '80s and early '90s. But instead of being eager to welcome in retail stores to replace the bad reputation of Peter Gatien's club, the Flatiron community board instead came off sounding like Reverend Moore in , expressing fears that the new plan was a ruse to return to days past. The Board Landmark Chairman recommended rejecting the proposal because he worried that the retail proposal is "one big dodge to get a club going there." He also pointed to a large empty space in the floor plan that would be "perfect for dancing." The development group denied they had any intention of shaking up their plans, only saying about the new space, "There's going to be nothing else like it."

