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Essex Flowers, the artist-run collective and gallery that opened in 2013 in the basement of a Lower East Side flower shop on Grand Street before moving around the corner to Ludlow Street late last year, will uproot itself from the block entirely next month by moving to Monroe Street in Chinatown.
“We needed more room!” Essex Flowers associate Kendra Jayne Patrick said in an email to ARTnews. The new location is a 700-square-foot space at 19 Monroe Street, in what used to be the offices of a small construction company, near the shadows of the Manhattan Bridge, between Catherine and Market Streets. That puts it within spitting distance of a few other galleries in this Chinatown corridor that flanks the Lower East Side, including 55 Gansevoort spin-off 56 Henry and the relocated Foxy Production.
(It’s also, as Patrick points out, just a few blocks from the bar Mr. Fong’s, which is pretty popular as a post-opening drinking spot.)
The final show at the old space—which has for the past few months lived at the quirky address of 54.5 Ludlow Street—is also the first show at the new space, and it’s set to be a doozy. Dubbed “The New York Flower Festival,” it’s three weeks of performances at the new and old Essex Flowers locations, with appearances from Max Steele, Heather Guertin, Dome Theatre, Phillip Birch, and many others. There will be a performance each night of the show’s run, which goes until June 14.
As for the flower shop that originally hosted the kunsthalle-esque gallery—also called Essex Flowers, and available to provide bouquets to gallerygoers—it, too, moved late last year, but just across the street. No word on whether the new Essex Flowers location will have a floral component.