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Best Bets: Week of March 21, 2016

First Look
This April, the Columbus Circle subway concourse will become TurnStyle, an underground marketplace with 32 shops and a performance space.


Live music: A sound system and stage for performances scheduled with collaborators including Lincoln Center.
Drink: Ellary’s Greens juices, 2beans espresso, Kit’s Underground wines.
Accessories: David Bowie–print umbrellas from Fab, Project No. 8 on-site-customized key tags, Spectre & Co. men’s tweed wool blazers, Marc Tetro graphic tote bags.
Food: Gastronomie 491 gourmet market, Doughnuttery mini-doughnuts, Dylan’s Candy Bar.


2x2: Two-legged tables
For that lean-against-the-wall look.


Colorful
Side table: Menu Yeh wall table, $130 at interiordesignerdecor.com.
Console: Leaning Man console, $381 at nest.co.uk.


Natural
Side table: Brunel Lean-to side table, $136 at heals.com.
Console: Georg console, $725 at store.dwell.com.


Ask a Shop Clerk
Theater composer Alan Cancelino just opened House of La Rue (106 Thames St., Bushwick).


So are you the new Patricia Field for Bushwick’s glam set? I was saddened by the recent closing of her store. We have more gymwear here, like sequined drop-crotch joggers ($78). My size-17 pink patent heels are also under $100. A lot of the crazier clothing out there is, like, $1,000; no one who would actually wear it can afford it.






Three in One
Nearly five years after closing its last New York shop, Sonia Rykiel (816 Madison Ave.) reopens with an in-store library and café.


1. Shop: The brand’s first North American store under creative director Julie de Libran carries cashmere unisex sweaters ($990), embroidered denim jackets ($1,260), and red leather totes ($1,260).
2. Read: Red-lacquer bookshelves carry more than 15,000 titles, with classic French literature like Balzac’s Le Père Goriot in the main room and Henry Miller’s erotica in the dressing rooms.
3. Drink: The carpet of the clothing section gives way to black-and-white flooring where there are rattan bistro chairs and round white-marble tables for complimentary coffee (or reading Balzac).


Micromarket
 Three new mom-run play spaces with drop-in hours.


The Playroom NYC
Liat and Tali, a pair of neighborhood sisters with four tots between them, unveiled this 3,000-square-foot romper room (1439 First Ave.; 212-729-6149). All the equipment is custom-designed for the preschool set, including a brilliant light-switch wall where little hands can freely satisfy their urge to flip the bulbs on and off. $30 per session.

Curiosity on Court
Brooklyn mom/Little Seeds preschool owner Catherine McKeown opened this 2,300-square-foot exploratorium (278 Court St.; 347-294-0160) featuring interactive, New York–themed stations by famed museum exhibit designer Paul Orselli Workshop. $25 to play all day.

Recess d.u.m.b.o.
After bonding in their building’s playroom, local moms Alexa Englander and Caroline Pardo created this rustic, 2,200-square-foot play loft (81 Washington St.; 347-987-3509), a fantasyland of one-of-a-kind wooden climbing structures. $30 per session.


Trend Spawning
The return of lettuceware.


September 1969:
Dodie Thayer crafts lettuce-shaped ceramic tureens (molded from real pieces of lettuce) to sell at the Palm Beach kitchen-goods store Au Bon Gout, where socialite C. Z. Guest quickly purchases them.






December 1998:
Interior designer Todd Alexander Romano has lunch with C.Z. at her home, where he’s introduced to her and daughter Cornelia’s Thayer collection. “I fell in love with the charm and whimsy of it,” he says.






Spring 2011:
Tory Burch, whose first Thayer piece was a Christmas gift from her mom after college, visits Romano’s showroom to buy Thayer’s roughage-inspired pitchers and plates.






August 2015:
Brooklyn ceramists Chen Chen and Kai Williams cast three different types of cabbages and sell them as planters (from $44).






October 2015:
Sotheby’s auctions off about 90 percentof C. Z. Guest’s lettuceware collection, including a 1969 and a 1972 tureen, which sell for $17,500.






March 2016:
Tory Burch adds lettuceware pitchers ($148) and crudité dishes ($195) to her Dodie Thayer for Tory Burch Home line; on March 29, Romano will auction off some of his Thayer collection through Christie’s.






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