Smoke Jazz Club And Big Gay Ice Cream Both Reopening On UWS: Report

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — A pair of major Upper West Side establishments are reopening soon after extended closures.

The Smoke Jazz Club will reopen in a larger space at 2751 Broadway in July after a two-year indoor closure. The club has taken on two adjacent storefronts and will reopen with a live show on July 21.

Big Gay Ice Cream will reopen even sooner at 516 Columbus Ave., according to the WestSideRag. The frozen scoops store was evicted at the beginning of March due to issues with unpaid rent, court records show.

Here's more information about both reopenings.

Smoke Jazz Club

A live show hasn't taken place inside Smoke's home at the corner of 106th Street since the middle of March 2020.

Its first show inside of the new space will take place on July 21, with the tenor saxophonist George Coleman.

Most notably in the new changes to the space — the stage.

The stage is some 40 square feet larger than it used to be, reported WBGO. Additionally, the number of seats has nearly doubled, a long banquette has replaced the old bar, which was moved into a new adjacent lounge, WBGO added.

"BIG NEWS! We are excited to announce our reopening," Smoke wrote Monday on its Facebook.

Co-owner and founder Paul Stache and Molly Johnson were in longtime discussions about adding the new space and used the pandemic to fully complete the project.

Smoke Jazz Club, which first opened in 1999, received a Shuttered Venue Operators Grant during the pandemic through the Small Business Administration, which guaranteed the venue's reopening.

You can find out more about Smoke Jazz Club and check out its calendar of performances on its website.

Big Gay Ice Cream

Big Gay Ice Cream is reopening this weekend at Columbus Avenue and 85th Street with new ownership, according to the WestSideRag.

The ice cream spot has been taken over by local Jeremy Wladis, who already owns the neighborhood spots "Good Enough to Eat," "Harvest Kitchen," and "Nina's Burrito Bar," reported the Rag.

Big Gay Ice Cream was evicted from the UWS storefront in March because of unpaid rent, court records show.

The closure came four years after the ice cream business signed a 10-year lease for the Upper West Side location in 2018, court documents show.

It's unclear if the new owner took on the old lease or worked out a new deal with the building's management.