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New Yorkers fed up with dating apps and social media now have a place in the real world to find their missed love connections — a boutique Manhattan hotel serving up old-school “Craigslist vibes.”
Romer Hell’s Kitchen has been posting missed connections in its window since January, with fleeting love matches including dueling yogurt enthusiasts at the Amish Market and dog lovers near Washington Square Park — one of whom donned a bright pink scarf wrapped around her “babushka-style.”
“He paid for my subway as I was on the phone complaining about my Apple Pay and Wallet acting up,” one submission reads. “He swooped in and paid for mine, when I looked up he giggled, smiled and winked and then walked down on the platform.”
“At the coffee shop with the green awning on 46th Street,” another flyer details. “He has light colored hair, wears trendy outfits and has an accent. He had such a good smile!”
The brains behind the quirky forum is Romer Hell’s Kitchen’s designated “Mayor of the Block” Briar Rose DeTomasso, who told The Post the setup is a throwback to the days when a near-miss love connection meant placing an ad in the Village Voice or on Craigslist has quickly resonated with an unlikely crowd.
“There is this sense of younger New Yorkers looking for in-person connection,” DeTomasso said. “People are hungry for this.”
The lonely hearts’ pleas were first put up Jan. 28 in the hotel’s lobby windows — overlooking the busy pedestrian thoroughfare near 52nd Street – and the display has drawn dozens of submissions since.
The idea for the board was partially inspired by a similar forum in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, she said.
The popularity of the project has even led to a partnership with Missed Connections NYC — an online-only service — which has since supplied a handful of West Side-based submissions to the in-person notice board.
“Only in New York are we hustling and bustling, and it’s that rarity of seeing someone on the street for a quick moment and having a connection with them that makes so much sense for us [to do this],” DeTommaso said.
“We stand to be a gathering spot for a neighborhood, and inherently, missed connections happen in neighborhoods.”
The “Mayor of the Block” occasionally updates the eight-sign grid of posts, with the recent submissions from Union Square Park (“I told him I liked his green Reeboks”) all the way to the Myrtle-Wyckoff train station in Bushwick, Brooklyn (“She was very pretty, her outfit says a lot, but she seemed very introverted”).
While DeTommaso isn’t aware of any second-chance meet-ups that have taken place thanks to the board, she promised any matches made through the program would “get a dinner at [Romer’s speakeasy piano bar] So-and-So’s and stay in the hotel.”
Singles still have the chance to submit online through mid-March, though DeTommaso may keep extending the fun should submissions keep rolling in.
“The more [submissions] I’m getting, the more I’m inclined to keep it for us,” DeTommaso said. “We really want to [keep it]. I think it’s something that could be ever-evolving.”
As Mayor of the Block, Greenpoint resident DeTommaso is in charge of kickstarting all of Romer’s programming to get locals through the door, from a speed dating series in the hotel’s piano bar speakeasy to a vintage market from 49th Street vendors.
Yet, none seem to have gained as much universal adornment as the second-chance dating vessel.
“We just think it’s of the times,” DeTommaso said. “It’s a novelty to meet people in person and date local, so I felt like it really fit for what we do as a gathering spot for the neighborhood, but also a lot of the programming that we create.
“And it’s a fun message to be like, ‘now go find someone at your local bar.’”
