By Scott Etkin and Lisa Kava
Super Nice Pizza, a new concept from dessert chef Dan Cohen, is planning to open at 975 Amsterdam (West 108th Street). The storefront, which used to be the Thai restaurant Spice, is around the corner from Super Nice Coffee and Bakery, Cohen’s doughnut shop that he opened in 2022 and has been named one of the best in NYC by The Infatuation. Before he was known for doughnuts, Cohen was known for Danny Macaroons, which had a fan-favorite booth at Brooklyn’s Smorgasburg market. Now, he’s again trying his hand at something new. “I eat more pizza than anything else, so when the opportunity came up to open a restaurant, I figured I may as well do what I know,” Cohen wrote in a message to West Side Rag. Plans for the restaurant include a full bar and pizza pies only – no slices. We’ll post an update when the restaurant is closer to opening.
Auntie Anne’s, the pretzel company, is opening this fall at 2658 Broadway (between West 96th and West 97th streets), and the location will include a “Carvel Express” from Carvel, the soft serve ice cream company, a representative told West Side Rag in an email. Signage has been up since February. Auntie Anne’s is a chain with locations throughout the country. They serve large soft pretzels in a variety of flavors such as original, cinnamon sugar, sweet almond, and pepperoni pretzel. They also sell mini pretzels in snack buckets. “Carvel Express is a smaller version of our classic ice cream shoppe with a limited menu that still features fan favorites like The Original Soft Serve Sundae Dashers, and other delicious ice cream treats,” the representative wrote. (Thanks to Maureen for the tip.)
WTHN, an acupuncture clinic, is opening at 69 West 71st Street (between Central Park West and Columbus) on September 12th. They have existing locations in Flatiron and WIlliamsburg, Brooklyn. WTHN is not an acronym, rather it is pronounced “within” which represents how acupuncture works “to heal the body from within and to treat the root cause,” Michelle Larivee, founder and CEO told West Side Rag. Larivee created WTHN after she found acupuncture to relieve her own chronic pain resulting from a ski accident. “A year later, faced with fertility challenges, I was able to successfully get pregnant naturally with acupuncture,” she told the Rag. “I wanted to help others access the same transformative health benefits of Chinese medicine that I experienced first hand.” Prior to founding WTHN Larivee worked in healthcare finance.
WTHN’s Upper West Side location will offer “immersive experiences including acupuncture on heated tables, ear seeding, aromatherapy, and sound meditations.” WTHN offers monthly memberships with three different tiers and is extending a 30% founding membership to the first 100 new members. “The Upper West Side’s close-knit, family-oriented community with its strong focus on health and wellness is the perfect fit for WHTN and we can’t wait to share our unique approach to healing with the community,” Larivee said in a press release. The space was at one time the coffee and dessert shop Cafe La Fortuna, which closed in 2008, and more recently Drybar, a hair styling salon, which closed in April 2023.
L’Occitane, the French skin and body care company, has opened a boutique at 416 Columbus Avenue (at West 80th Street). L’Occitane, founded in 1976, had two longtime stores on the Upper West Side: one at 69th and Columbus and the other on 76th and Broadway. They closed in January 2021 when the parent company filed for bankruptcy and shuttered 23 stores. It appears that the company reorganized and restructured its lease portfolio in August 2021. L’Occitane sells cleansers, moisturizers, face and body scrubs, serums, oils, fragrances and hair care products. Scotch and Soda, a clothing store that closed in 2023, was previously in the space. L’Occitane’s hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday to Saurday and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sundays.
A temporary campaign field office, run together by Broadway Democrats and Three Parks Democrats, is expected to open this week at 2742 Broadway (between West 105th and 106th streets). People will be able to sign up for canvass trips to swing districts, do phone banking, mail postcards, register to vote, and receive buttons and campaign merchandise for making a donation. They are also looking for volunteers. The storefront was formerly home to Blondi’s Hair Salon III. (Thanks to Gus for the write-up.)
Pig & Khao, a Southeast Asian restaurant with Filipino and Thai influences, has signage up at 433 Amsterdam (between West 80th and 81st streets). They posted on Instagram that they’re planning to open this fall. Leah Cohen, a chef known for appearing on the TV show Top Chef, opened the first Pig & Khao downtown on Clinton Street in 2012. They also have a sister restaurant, Piggyback, on West 30th Street. The space was formerly RA Sushi. We’ll post an update when the restaurant is closer to opening.
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La Fortuna is one of those losses that still hurts 16 years later.
Cafe La Fortuna was a wonderful gem of the UWS. My wife of 25 years and I went there on our first date back in 1997. I will never forget.
My husband and I (of 16 years) had our first date there too!
Wasn’t L’Occitane on like Broadway and 85th or so as well?
“ Super Nice Pizza, a new concept from dessert chef…” Nope.
It sounds like a vehicle for selling alcohol.
Sorry, WTHN. In English, if you want me to pronounce a word, you have to give me vowels. Without vowels (and especially if you want it in BLOCK CAPITALS), you’ve got an acronym – “W – T – H – N”.
While I welcome you to the neighborhood and wish your business much success, you don’t get to rewrite the rules that come with the language.
Technically, WTHN is not an acronym (initial letters that form a pronounceable word) but rather an initialism. But because English gotta do what English gotta do (CHANGE), ‘acronym’ has absorbed ‘initialism.’
I use WTHN for What-The-Hell-Now?
If there are openings listed here would you also include if the business or nonprofit or pop up or volunteer opportunity is actively taking applicants info and at what email address or physical address or Google form or phone to connect with in order to welcome properly—- with people who want to work in the neighborhood. I think if it becomes a requirement for every listing then the access becomes more of an open door literally and figuratively. Hope it helps our neighborhood.
Auntie Anne’s…. Why?
Exactly. It’s garbage food that’s ridiculously overpriced, although with Manhattan commercial rents, they probably HAVE to charge that much. It’s something like $7 for a pretzel that when I was a kid cost 15 cents, which would be $1.55 in today’s dollars. $7 should buy a burger or a sandwich or a fruit salad, not a pretzel.
Auntie Annne’s is garbage food but it is delicious. Anyone complaining about prices blame NYC Government and State as the real estate taxes for building is enormous and goes up every year thus causing inflation even in years when the rest of the country doesn’t have inflation.
I wouldn’t have minded it if we also got Cinnabon but it looks like we got Carvel instead…
Yeah, Pig & Khao s opening in my neighborhood. Hope they make the space a little interesting than before. It was a little put-off when the space was Haru.
Definitely the one I am most excited for!
Super Nice is the best—can’t wait to try their pizza, and so happy something is going into that Spice space.
Super Nice’s present location for doughnuts is 108 and Amsterdam. The new pizza and ice cream place is on Broadway based on walking by the storefront on the weekend. Though I can’t remember the cross street.
Unless they’re opening two locations – or – someone else is on the pizza & ice cream combo bandwagon.
the place on broadway is a different soft serve ice cream and pizza place on 112 and Broadway on the South East corner. Supernice is opening the pizza place where Spice was on the South East corner of 108 and Amsterdam.
I used to love going to Super Nice but the last 3 times I never made it to the window after waiting 15 minutes on the line with only a few people in front of me. So hopefully this new place will have better service since we don’t go there anymore because they’re way too slow and unorganized.
Yes. I went by it again last night to remind myself what the name was on the window signage. (What was once Liberty House.) It will be called Upside Pizza / Softside Ice Cream. I guess pizza and ice cream spots has become a trend. No word on a full bar, unlike Super Nice, and I presume due to proximity to Columbia this will be a more casual place and offer slices.
I implore you ,… Please tell us WHEN Mermaid Inn is opening? The most anticipated opening since,….it closed and announced it was reopening!
Never can have enough Pizza Shops, I will try them all!
All are Welcome to the Westside!
I live around the corner from the Mermaid Inn, and a couple of weeks ago a man who might be the owner told me it’s due to open late this month — and the progress being made on the interior tells me he probably right.
Carvel???
Are ice cream stores the new nail salons?
For all the gelato and high-end ice cream places that have suddenly filled our neighborhood, not a single one has soft serve. *That* will be a welcome addition, and a happy break from all the others.
The ice cream/doughnut shop on the corner of Columbus and 85th sells ONLY soft serve,
New sample sale store on the SE corner of 96 and Columbus too. Don’t know the details, just saw on my walk to the train yesterday.
Talk about burying the lead – we are getting a Carvel! Carvel is the best. It is America’s freshest ice cream. Not this over-priced pretentious gourmet stuff. Any kid who grew up within a few miles of a Carvel loves it. I had their cakes for many childhood birthday parties.
Yeah!
If they properly clean the machines at night. If they don’t, it’s a bacteria haven. That’s why you never buy soft serve from a truck – you have no idea if they get properly cleaned. But it is not “American’s freshest ice cream”. It’s made from a manufactured mix, just like almost all soft serve ice-cream.
Interesting.
On the other hand, people seem to continue to flock to food carts and food trucks – tacos, souvlaki etc – that sell meat dishes and apparently unworried about any safety or sanitary issues.
Same thing with the food vendors at street “fairs”
The old show Dirty Jobs had a segment on a potato chip factory – who knew the huge job it was to clean potato chip equipment at night?
I don’t recall ever hearing a story about a Carvel bacterial outbreak.
Auntie Anne is 2568 Broadway
Bienvenue dans le quartier‼️
Welcome to the neighborhood
(West 80th Street). L’Occitane
Gives a fresh new elegant and fragrance look to the neighbors here on the Upper West Side.
So happy for Carvel soon on the UWS. Since it’s express, I will miss Fudgie the Whale.
A return to the neighborhood for Carvel, which had a store on Broadway around 98th Street, but closed circa 1985.
Carvel is OPEN!!