Revere Sugar Refinery Remembered in Oil

The House of Pizza and Calzone has made some additional changes since they revamped their home a few months back. Some changes are lamentable: two flat-screen TVs that are always on. Others are kind of nice, including some crude oil painting depicting local Brooklyn scenes.

The biggest canvas is in the back room. It capture a section of the Red Hook waterfront, including the now vanished, conical Revere Sugar Refinery. Nice to see that structure live on in art.

Good Pizza; Bad Architecture

Many, including yours truly, were pleased with the recent redesign of the House of Pizza and Calzone on Union Street in Brooklyn. It looks completely different from what it was, but the look is an attractive, tradition-conscious reimagining of the space.

What a disappointment, then, that the pizzeria's owner, Gino Vitale, didn't bring the same sense of style and appropriateness to the faux-Italianate piece of crapitecture he's erecting at 91, 93, 95, 97 and 99 King Street, corner of Richards Street, in Red Hook (below). According to a article in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle that reads like an advertisement (a quote from the broker saying the building is beautiful and unique? Come on!), Vitale based the five single-family townhouses on carriage houses he saw during a recent trip in Italy. A guess a few arches makes for a palazzo, huh?


Granted, this creation of Vitale's (he designs everything he builds) is a notch about the usual callous pile of bricks that we see these days. But it's also more vulgar, because those pile of bricks don't pretend to be grand or artistic. They're just crap. He's built fancy crap and is calling it gold.

The one-to-three bedroom homes are going for $750,000 to $1.3 million. Buyers can enjoy "skylight-lit living areas and a full package of high-end appliances." Vitale thinks they'd be great for artists, given the high ceilings and large windows. He must mean established artists. What other artists have a mil sitting in the bank?

The worse news? "Vitale...plans 20 more similar carriage house-style homes."

Inside the New House of Pizza & Calzone

The House of Pizza and Calzone, legendary pie place on Union Street in Brooklyn, is back open for business, after a month-long renovation.

I've reported earlier on the new hand-painted sign and the sliding glass-door frontage. Inside, it doesn't look anything like it did before. The joint boasts yards and yards of elbow room you never imagined was there before. Cramped before, the pizzeria is now ridiculously spacious. In a nod to the past, the old, boxy, gray-marble tables are still in use. Above them are some modern lighting fixtures, attached to warm brown walls. The bathrooms are big and on the fancy side for a slice-monger. The ceiling remains unfinished, as does a huge, brick-walled, additional dining room in the space, and a backyard patio. I'm guessing seating will top 200 when all is said and done.

And the pizza. Still good, still the same. Though I wish they'd dust the floors of the pizza ovens with semolina flour the way the old owners used to. Just a suggestion, guys.

Outside, a shiny black town car with tinted windows, and a shiny black SUV with tinted windows were idling, waiting for their pies. I'm not saying anything.

House of Pizza & Calzone Makes Sign By Hand!

Back in late August, when the owner of Brooklyn's House of Pizza & Calzone was taking down the shop's cheesy, but beloved old awning in preparation of a massive redo, he was cagey about what sort of signage would take the awning's place. One feared the worst (that is, a run-of-the-mill, "dignified," gentrification-special, cloth awning of either bright red or deep green).

What a surprise and relief, then, to pass down Union Street today and see the pizzeria had gone the very appealing, but rarely traveled, hand-painted-sign route. Over a coat of chocolate-brown paint applied directly to the building's old brickface, has been painted, in cream-colored letters, "The Famous House of Pizza & Calzone." The first four words are small and in cursive, with "Pizza" and "Calzone" dominating the eye.

I know a lot of criticisms can be made against this approach: that it trucks in faux nostalgia, is precious and chases after the bourgeois crowd. But just think of the other ways they could have gone with the signage. If it was impossible to keep the old sign, I think this is much the preferable option.

Shed Stripped Away From New House of Pizza & Calzone

The owners of the House of Pizza and Calzone in Carroll Gardens, who are renovating the half-century-old pizzeria, stripped away on Sept. 13 the plywood shed that has been masking their efforts since late August.

By the looks of it, pretty fair progress has been made on the joint in the last two weeks. The new facade will be all glass, with a glass door to the left, and a sliding glass unit, four panels wide, to the right. This, I imagine, will give the place an airy new feel. The new counter remains to the right as you walk in, the customer alley to the left. Some tiny halogen lights hang above. And a red brick arch in the back leads to a new dining area that reaches into the former backyard of the property. It will be a new House altogether, to be sure.

House of Pizza & Calzone Wasn't Built in a Day

When the House of Pizza and Calzone in Carroll Gardens was closed and wrapped up in tarp and plywood last week for a massive renovation, a sign outside read, "Closed for vacation. Will reopen Tuesday, Sept. 2."

Today, Sept. 1, it read "Closed for Renovation. Will reopen Sept. ?"

Everyone in the neighborhood knew that "Sept. 2" was wishful thinking, even with the furious pace the Calzone team was working at. The owners are turning everything upside-down. The inside is gutted, save for the pizza ovens; you can see clear through to the back yard. The face is being cleaned and spruced up. The cornice is already repainted. Old iron pillars near the front were replaced with steel I-beams. I'd say Sept. 22 is the earliest they should be thinking. If that.

House of Pizza & Calzone to Get Complete Makeove

One of the most beloved slice joints in all of Brooklyn—the House of Pizza and Calzone on Union Street between Hicks and Columbia—is currently undergoing a complete redo.

Pizza lovers from Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill and Red Hook who only last week sat at one of the terminally odd, boxy, gray-marble tables and munched a perfectly burnt, tangy and flavorful slice at the 56-year-old eatery, were today greeted by a building-enveloping blue tarp, a dumpster full of debris, sawhorses, plastic buckets, a plywood wall—are the earmarks of major construction.

The House was bought by new owners, Paul Diagostino and Gino Vitale, back in 2004. They have painstakingly tried to maintain the reputation of the signature plain pie and huges calzones, while adding a variety of new pies and various panini. Some believe the pizza hasn't changed and is just as good as always; others think there was a falling off. (I personally still find the slices satisfying, even if something ineffable was lost when those two old guys with the raspy voices, Onofrio Gaudioso and John Teutonico, stopped throwing the dough. Call it the flavor of experience.)

For a couple years, the new owners have been working on a backyard patio of sorts, which would provide extra seating. Now it looks like the main room will be redone as well. Neighbors say the interior with boast a completely new look. The owner, sitting outside, said he wished the design to be a surprise. He confirmed, however, that the House would have a new awning—sad news for those how loved the cheesy, grimy, old red-green-and-white one, with its hand-painted Italian chef holding a steaming pie. The guy wasn't lying; the old awning was strapped to the roof of a nearby van, ready to be carted off to the awning graveyard.