John Garbarini

Obituary of John Garbarini
John Garbarini, 72, a long-time denizen of the East Village and Little Italy who appreciated New York City's quirks and color, left our world on June 11. He passed at Bellevue Hospital after complications from heart failure. His sisters, MaryAnne and Alice, and Alice's husband, Dan, were nearby at the end of his life.
John would have turned 73 on the 27 of June, strawberry season. His mother thought strawberry shortcake appropriate for his birthday in suburban Dumont, New Jersey, though the only red berries she could get were from the A&P freezer.
The Brains of the Outfit
Born with smarts and charm to Anne and John Garbarini, he earned a scholarship to St. Nicholas of Tolentine Catholic High School in the Bronx. The school was known citywide for its basketball program, and John played on the team with a set of triplet brothers he befriended. He lived with his Italian grandmother, Rose Garbarini of the Bronx, during the school week. In Rosie's apartment, he enjoyed homemade ravioli and slow-cooked sauce.
That love of Italian food stuck with him. He still had Rosie's cracked pink-rose-strewn pasta bowl in his East Village apartment and he asked two younger neighborhood friends, Tyler Jopek and Francisca Wistuba, to bring him big tortelloni and good olive oil from Russo's, an Italian grocery shop (since 1908) on East 11 Street.
Self-Starter
John was a caddy at White Beeches Golf and Country Club in Haworth, New Jersey and had a mind for investing since he was a teenager. He went to Cooper Union in New York City for engineering but after three years, switched to photography. He took photos for the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and of a pretty model standing on a television set for a massive Samsung advertisement in Times Square. His mother made sure the family piled into the white Ford Falcon and drove by to admire it.
In later years, John became a contractor, perfecting lofts and other spaces in the New York area and often working with his brother, Will. Like their Uncle Aldo, the brothers had a way with tools and respected them. Some of John's cherished tools have now been bestowed on friends in the city, including Anthony, who helped him out.
Tools of the Trade
"Even one of John's tools will be a great thing to remember him by," says Jopek, who hired him for repairs at his First Avenue business. "He taught me so much. He was the most real guy. He was kind, he knew so much, and he loved to poke people's buttons. I learned a lot from him. He dabbled in everything, and he dabbled with the best of them."
Artist and filmmaker Bobby Dean Dempsey, an East Village friend, remembered John's comments about the Mulberry Street loft he lived in for decades, across from a churchyard. "John was always quick to correct people when they said he lived in David Bowie's building. 'No," he would say, 'David Bowie lived in my building.'"
"John was really a polymath. He did a lot of different things and was a master at many," says Dempsey.
Following his father before him, John did The New York Times crossword daily, on paper, until days before his passing, thanks to a delivery from Dempsey or a photocopy from Ann, an upstairs neighbor. He was an avid reader, a cigar aficionado, a cook, and a thinker.
John is survived by his three younger siblings, MaryAnne, Will Garbarini, Alice Garbarini Hurley (Dan Hurley); two nieces, Anne Caroline Hurley and Alexa Marquez; and many friends in the city. His spirit lives on in the hopes and dreams of New Yorkers.