According to Richard Dalton of the Back Bay Restaurant Group, the locally owned chain of restaurant concepts has executed a lease with the owners of the property at 26 Exeter Street to lease the former TGI Friday’s restaurant space and they intend to renovate or replace the existing attached greenhouse that was added to the Newbury Street side of the building on the Newbury Street side many years ago.

According to Dalton, the company was scheduled to appear before the Back Bay Architectural Commission (BBAC) at its meeting last night (September 15 – after the Back Bay Sun deadline), to discuss the glass-sided addition that has vexed the neighborhood for so long.

“We will be reviewing how we plan on treating what I will refer to as the ugly black box that is on the side of the building,” said Dalton, “and what we think is an attractive alternative that will fit in better with the rest of the street.”

Dalton did not go into detail about the company’s plan for renovating the addition, but he did say that BBRG had already met with members of the Neighborhood Association of the Back Bay (NABB) Architecture Committee to make a presentation.

“From my perspective, I thought the meeting went well and our proposal, overall, was well-received,” said Dalton. “We have an exciting plan for the space and it is one we think will be a benefit to the neighborhood.”

According to NABB Architecture Committee member Sue Prindle, the group was not exactly opposed to BBRG’s plan, but they would also like to see it go further.

“In terms of our reaction to the plan, what we’d really like is to have the thing removed,” said Prindle. “But they want to make some changes to the structure and we feel that in order to rebuild it they would have to go to the Zoning Board of Appeals for a variance and we’d like to see them go through that process.”

According to Prindle, BBRG’s plan is to replace the existing black glass walls with “something retractable, where the roof would go back and the doors would go up and it would be with clear glass and plexiglass on top, but it would be in the same footprint as the existing (structure).”

Like hairstylists and mechanics, a good tailor can be hard to find. There’s an art form to perfect pleats and amazing alterations, and loyal customers will gladly pay extra for services they can trust.

In the Back Bay, loyal customers have been turning to Antonio Rivas at Newbury Tailoring Company for years. Newbury Tailoring Company was recently named “Best Tailor” by Boston Magazine for the second year in a row. It’s where Newbury Street’s finest clothiers — Chanel, Valentino, DKNY — send their customers when a couture gown needs to be taken in a smidge or when a hemline needs to be taken up a bunch.

“Most of the other tailors today, they don’t even let you talk,” said Newbury Tailoring Company owner Antonio Rivas. “You go to them and they don’t even let you ask questions. They do it their way. I listen to the customers and it’s all up to them because it is the customer who is wearing the clothing.”

Rivas, 51, has been honing his skills with the scissors since the age of seven, when he began helping in his father’s tailoring shop in Guatemala. There are many tailors in Rivas’s family, including his grandfather and his father’s uncle. When Rivas immigrated to Boston 25 years ago, he got more tailoring experience working at some of the big clothing companies in the area. Then, in 1997, he and his brother Carlos opened Newbury Tailoring Company on the third floor of a brownstone at 129 Newbury Street.

“Word of mouth spread quickly about our services and we were busy — really busy,” he said. “On Saturdays, customers couldn’t even get into our waiting room.”

Two years ago, after clearly outgrowing its space, Newbury Tailoring Company moved to its current location at 91 Newbury Street. Now on the second floor, the business has Newbury Street signage, and more and more customers are discovering Rivas and his other trained tailors.

Rivas says the majority of his customers are women, which he believes speaks for the quality of his work.

“You have to be really, really good to work with women because they dress really well,” he said.

He has loyal customers from all over Boston, some who have been coming to him for years. One couple came to Rivas when they were getting married and he did alterations for their whole bridal party. Since then, he has done work on maternity clothes when the wife became pregnant, and he’s kept the growing family in style as the children have gotten older.

“With my customers, they are not so much like a customer but like a friend,” he said. “Building a relationship is good, like a family.”

Some of his clients split time between Boston and New York or Connecticut, and they’ll turn over their wardrobes to Rivas for alternations while here and then wait for him to mail the clothes back to them.

In addition to traditional tailoring services, Rivas also does custom work — dresses, shirts, blouses and suits. A large portion of Newbury Tailoring Company’s business is hemming jeans, because Rivas and his tailors will keep the much-coveted original hem on those designer denims.

Rivas doesn’t plan on hanging up his needle and thread any time soon, which is good news to his fashion-conscious clients.

“From here to another three years, it will become harder and harder to find skilled tailors,” he said. “Today, most tailors just do one thing. It is a dying art in Boston.”

Last Friday, USAToday threatened with its front-page headline that “Foreclosure Proceedings Set Record —Mortgage Mess Could Set Off Chain Reaction.” For weeks, the near-apocalyptic stories about real estate woes have dominated the news and caused many homeowners stress and anxiety.

But in the Back Bay, there is good news, as real estate agents say the bubble has not burst here.

“The sub-prime market hasn’t really hit the Back Bay,” Geoffrey Reynolds of Copley Real Estate on Newbury St. said. “It really is more about people … who had been just looking to get into a mortgage and got into an adjustable rate mortgage they couldn’t afford.”

Which isn’t to say that the market in the Back Bay is as red hot as it was three years ago. Real estate agents agree that the market has leveled a bit but not dipped nearly as much as in the rest of the state, where median single home prices are down 4.6 percent compared to July 2006.

“There are still a lot of buyers waiting for the inventory, so the market hasn’t flattened too much,” Art Rawding of Newbury Street’s Otis and Ahearn Real Estate said. “Fundamentally, the market is very different in the Back Bay. It can’t be lumped in with the rest of Massachusetts.”

Rawding said that these days, he advises his home sellers to be as knowledgeable as possible when entering the market – because the buyers sure are. His listings are still selling, but he’s seeing fewer transactions taking place. A property priced too high will not move, and in fact he is seeing many properties selling at two percent below the listing price.

“The main thing I’m telling my sellers is to be very realistic about the current state of the market,” Rawding said. “It’s not the same as six months ago.”

Reynolds said he’s seeing properties sit on the market for an average length of two to three months, which is a little longer than the average from 2002 to 2005 in what he describes as an “abnormal” market. He also said the key is pricing the property correctly from the outset.

“If it sits on the market too long, it will start to get a stigma,” Reynolds said.

One trend in the Back Bay market that has become more and more widespread of the past few years is the concept of “staging” a property. Rawding says hiring a consultant to prep a property by rearranging and renting new furniture and reorganizing home accessories is a way to make a property stand out. In the Back Bay, updated kitchens and baths are also de rigueur.

“The ‘turnkey’ concept is very important in today’s market,” Rawding said. “A lot of people don’t have the time or the energy for extensive renovations.”

Rawding has been in the industry for two decades, and Reynolds has 12 years under his belt. Both have been through the highs and the lows in the Boston real estate market and remain optimistic about the future.

“The Boston market, compared to nationwide, is still relatively healthy,” Reynolds said. “Things should be back to normal in the spring.”

Festive block party or noisy neighborhood nuisance?

That was the question before the Back Bay Licensing and Building Use Committee Monday night, as the body listened to opposing viewpoints on the neighborhood’s annual Bastille Day festival: a once-a-year tribute to French culture that includes live music, food, and alcohol.

Tom High, the committee chairman, noted for the record that many residents sent in letters in support of Bastille Day, and that most of the resident feedback to this point has been positive.

The committee has not yet said how its members view the celebration. But for some residents, the festival, which has grown over the years from attracting hundreds to drawing thousands, is misplaced in its current residential location on Marlborough Street between Berkeley and Clarendon Streets.

According to resident Kathy Familetti, who lives in property abutting the festival location, the Bastille Day event creates a huge trash problem on the block that takes days to deal with.

“These are chronic violations,” said Familetti. “There is trash that we look at for days after the event. “ In particular, Familetti noted that there were dozens of beer kegs left out in plain view on the lawn of the library that were not removed for days.

Familetti also wondered if the festival could be aggravating the already existing rodent problem in the Back Bay. “We definitely noticed a new pattern of rodent activity immediately after the event,” she said.

Familetti stressed that she had no problem with Bastille Day festivities per se, but wished that the impact on the neighborhood could be lessened, either by increased attention to trash cleanup or by finding a new location. “It’s more a matter of neighborliness than anything,” she said.

Elainze Uzan Leary, the executive director of the French Library, responded that the library works extremely hard to ensure that trash removal is thorough and expedient. “We have a contractor that comes in to remove the garbage that very evening [after the festival],” she said.

Leary also rejected the notion that the festival is causing any rodent problem, claiming that the Back Bay’s problem with rats is well documented and a completely separate issue. “That is a Back Bay problem. It’s not a Bastille Day problem,” she said,

As for the beer kegs, Leary admitted that they were left in view this year, but said that all the kegs were on library property behind a fence, and that it was not a violation to have them in that area, where they are “as unobtrusive as possible.” The library is dependent on the liquor companies themselves, who donate the beer, to come and remove the kegs. Sometimes, she said, that can take a day or two.

Aside from cleanliness, noise was also at issue, with one Beacon St. resident claiming that the volume of the festival’s amplified music was completely inappropriate for the neighborhood, particularly late at night (Bastille Day runs until 10 p.m., although sometimes it goes over schedule).

“It’s unreasonable in our small family neighborhood,” said the resident, who requested that the festival either be held in a more appropriate location or without amplified music. “There are other venues that exist specifically for this type of event.”

Leary, however, stressed the importance of the even being held at the library location, as it allows the library to recoup the costs of the celebration by charging admission. If the celebration were moved to public or city owned land or facilities, the library would not be able to charge for the event. “Ideally a Bastille Day event would be free for all, but we just don’t have the financial means [not to charge admission],” she said. “

She also pointed out that the library has gone to great lengths to keep noise minimal, and that this year’s concerts had a volume cap of 75 decibels. She added that she and the library would consider whether that level could be further reduced.

The Bastille Day celebration in Boston has been held annually for 32 years. In all but two of those years, the event has occurred in the Back Bay. Keeping it there, according to Leary, is important to preserving the event’s character and significance. “We feel we bring a wonderful celebration to the Back Bay,” she said.

A recent Single Gourmet event at Brasserie Joe





Summer has slipped away, and with it only memories are left of that summer fling on Nantucket or that less-than-serious crush you enjoyed on the Cape. The long and cold winter has not snuck up on us yet, so now is the perfect time to jump back into the Boston dating arena. And if the bar scene isn’t your scene or you’re tired of browsing through endless profiles online, the Single Gourmet may be for you.

Single Gourmet is a membership organization that offers planned, hosted events such as dinners, social events and even travel experiences for area singles. Members choose from three to four events a month, paying only for the events they attend. The Boston chapter of the Single Gourmet was founded in 1999 by Melanie Cabot, a Boston native who had recently returned to the city, newly single, after living in New York for a few years. She was looking for a way to navigate the dating scene again and meet new people.

“I wanted to find a way to jumpstart my social life, which is a problem for many single people,” she said. “Diving back into the waters can be a little intimidating.”

At the same time, Cabot was impressed by the new restaurants around Boston that were flourishing since she had spent time away from the city. She decided to launch a Boston chapter of the New York-based organization Single Gourmet.

Almost right away, the Single Gourmet made a splash on the local social scene. For many singles, online dating sites, speed dating events and other dating services don’t work – but Single Gourmet is different.

“Sharing a meal with someone is important, and it’s a nice way to make a connection,” Cabot said. “It’s nice to have a social outlet like this.”

Deborah, a Single Gourmet member who lives in the Back Bay, said the club has been a great way for her to meet new people and make good friends. She has been a member for two years and attends events about every other month.

“It’s been fun. I’m relatively new to Boston, and I enjoy going out and eating, drinking, and talking with interesting people,” she said.

Deborah has tried other dating services but enjoys the Single Gourmet approach. “The difference is it’s not necessarily about dating. It’s more about going out in a group and meeting different people in an interesting setting,” she said.

There are currently about 500 members of the Boston chapter, and Cabot recently helped found Rhode Island and Connecticut chapters as well. Members, she said, are typically professionals who range in age from 40 to 60. “The common tie is a love of gourmet food and wine.”

With new restaurants opening every month in Boston and so many choices, Cabot said some singles find it can be difficult to plan great social gatherings on their own. With Single Gourmet, the events are carefully organized — from the restaurant choices to the menus selections offered that showcase the restaurant’s specialties. Each event also has a host who facilitates introductions and makes members feel welcome.

“We say it’s an elegant alternative,” Cabot says. “It’s a great way to meet people.”

The Back Bay is a frequent destination for Single Gourmet events. Later this month, for example, Davio’s in Park Square will play host to a dinner.

“There are so many choices in the Back Bay. It’s a great area,” Cabot said. “[The events] are a great way to get to know people while getting to know the great restaurants of the Back Bay.”

Keep the towing

The war on street cleaning has begun. Disgruntled scofflaws who didn’t move their cars for the street cleaner and got towed are grousing louder and louder. There are a lot of them — 21,000 cars have been towed by last count since April 15 when towing began, according to City Councilor Michael Flaherty.

A Globe columnist held forth last week about all the beleaguered Bostonians who are missing work and paying big fees because the city towed their cars on street cleaning day.

At-large City Councilor Michael Flaherty is now on the case. He has responded to complaints to his office about towing by announcing a hearing, to be scheduled in the next couple of weeks, to learn more from disgruntled parkers who did not read the street cleaning warning signs. He’s also worried that the tow companies are cleaning up in fees, while the city gets little. We urge those of you who like the clean streets that the towing brings us to get to that hearing to support the towing program.

We understand the aggravation, since over the years we have been towed ourselves a few times. But we have a hard time sympathizing with those who don’t move their cars. The towing has made an enormous difference since the street cleaner now enjoys a clear shot along the curb. No longer are the cigarette butts, dog poop, stray pieces of paper, leaves and general dirt laminated to the pavement. It’s a big change, and it is worth some aggravation on the part of Bostonians to change this city’s ranking as the filthiest in America to perhaps only second or third or fourth filthiest.
Flaherty says that people who don’t move their cars don’t purposefully leave their cars. He says they just forget. In theory, having one’s car towed make one remember in the future.

He says people tell him it’s hard to remember which street gets cleaned on which day. We say that anyone who is concerned about the quality of life in their neighborhood will use their noggin and read the signs, which are pretty clear in our neighborhood.

Flaherty says he wants to make sure each neighborhood gets tagged and towed equitably. He wants to see how the city can get more of the revenue that is now going to the tow companies — about $4.4 million. He wants to redress grievances such as the one from the man whose car was towed while he had stopped to pick up a suit in which to bury his recently deceased brother. He wants the contractors to refrain from towing cars that are parked after the street sweeper goes by. He wants signs that inform drivers when street cleaning takes place to be easy to read and posted in visible places.

Those goals are fine with us.

But don’t let up on the towing.