Another Irishman with a British accent and a store in NYC's Greenwich Village. I cannot say it any better than so so many others have already done today. One of the kindest, nicest people I have shared this planet with. May your next chapter be full of the love and laughter you gave to us all..........I am devastated by this news and will miss sitting on the bench for hours discussing politics, both national and local, all while watching you treat everyone who came by with so much love and respect.
This guy. Sean Kavanagh-Dowsett. Funny, punny, beautiful. So many memories of laughing and joking with him. There was almost nothing he couldn't take care of and he was always looking out for me (and everyone!). I will miss him terribly and my trips to NYC will not be the same without his presence. My heart goes out to Nicky Perry, Audrey and his family. An unbearable loss that they must bear. He will always live on in our hearts.
COOL FOR CATS! One of my dearest friends Sean Sean Kavanagh-Dowsett @kavanaghdowsett has left us..and has left a hole in my heart. We met in the 1980s and years later saw Sean at Bleeker Park in NYC he was the only dad in a Fluffer shirt and would pass the time watching our kids play and grow up. Every Halloween with the amazing costunes he made for Audrey, he and I would walk around Chelsea with our kids. But the really amazing thing Sean did was to accompany me on my annual cancer check ups and after we would go to Tea & Sympathy for my fav skineheads on rafts, cottage pie, and a cuppa. We would talk about fashion and denim of course, rant about politics, or he'd tell me a totally inapproriate joke. He would pick me up in his English taxi and was always there with a smile and a joke. We had this routine for many years and I feel gutted that will not see or talk to my amazing and true friend. My heart goes out to you Nicky ( one of the strongest woman I know ) and I have always admired your unbinding love for each other...and Audrey... may your love be your strength. I will miss You Sean! Thank you for being my friend...the Pearly King of NYC!
I’m devasted by the passing of one of the most joyful and charismatic people I’ve ever met - Sean Kavanagh-Dowsett, co-owner of Tea & Sympathy. A loving husband, father, community leader, gracious host and all-around character, his absence leaves a hole in all our hearts. Upon meeting him for the first time, Sean would treat you with the same jocularity, kindness and familiarly as someone he had known for decades. My heart goes out to his wife Nicky and daughter Audrey, whom he loved more than life itself.
We lost a British King in New York today. Sean Dowsett-Kavanagh. Loving husband to @nickyperry.kd & father to @audrey.kav. Sean was a friend for 30 years. I met him when he started dating Nicky, and I’ve never seen a man swoon over a woman, like he did with Nicky. They married and was always boastful about how much he loved her. Would always share his joy at finding rare gifts that were impossible to find for her. He never minced his words and could take the Mickey out of anyone, myself included and you’d tear up laughing. He was kind to everyone and didn’t suffer fools. We raised our daughters together and would pop into Bleecker Park back in the day, often by the sandpit with @abekton @samanthahall666 & bring us @teaandsympathynyc food and alcohol disguised. We’d sit on the park bench and laugh with Nicky for hours. They both made parenthood bearable amongst all the competitive parents we had to endure back then. He’d often be riding around the west village in his British Black taxi Cab and one day we took our girls to see One Direction at Jones Beach and were in line to get into Jones Beach-traffic line for days. He had a British flag on the taxi and as people passed us in line, Sean screamed out the window, “I’ve got the boys in the back”- he was referring to One Direction and of course it caused a Beatlemania craze around the taxi. Girls scrambling to look in the car. I cried laughing so hard. I never thought I’d be writing these words so soon, to someone that gave so much love to our community. He showed all of us how much he loved Nicky and Audrey. Today, I salute this fine gentleman, friend, one of a kind man that will remain in our hearts forever. Rest in peace, Sean. Love to you @nickyperry.kd & @audrey.kav
To have lost such a light seems so incredibly unjust. What a twinkling spirit! What a bawdy beaut of a man! Sean Kavanagh-Dowsett encapsulated love in all of its vividness and that was evident in every single pebble pressed into the asphalt of Greenwich Avenue. It shined through his everlasting devotion to his soul mate Nicky and their divine daughter Audrey, the blockbuster businesses they built together which thrived with theatricality, his fantastic dialect delivered with devilish delight, his comradery with longstanding customers, the joy he derived from political finger-poking and the problems of New York City proper, the grand jokes that always gassed the guts, his keen insights into almost everything. To say he was unique, impressive, charming, kind, dapper, and absolutely cool as fuck would be a disservice to description. He was quite simply one of the wisest, quick-witted wonders of the world. One the best blokes under the sun and I will love him forever. From the very bottom of my broken heart, it hurts to say goodbye. — with Sean Kavanagh-Dowsett at Tea & Sympathy.
Last weekend was a sad one, because we lost Sean Kavanagh-Dowsett. One of the friendliest faces on Greenwich Avenue, along with his wife Nicky, Sean ran Tea & Sympathy--the quirky english restaurant which somehow manages to make UK food tasty. (One trick is pureed parsnips to thicken and slightly sweeten their divine soups.) The restaurant's been on my block for decades, and a familiar pattern emerged. I'd see Nicky outside, she'd gripe about something and I would, too. Then Sean would pop out and punctuate our bitchfest with a dirty joke. He loved people and joking, even though sometimes his delivery was better than the jokes themselves. (He loved a looong joke with a suspect punchline.)
Together, Sean and Nicky cultivated a scene which attracted celebs from Boy George to David Bowie to Dame Judi Dench to SJP--along with neighbors like myself, and passersby like Flotilla Debarge. While I'll miss being "tag-teamed" by this couple of Brits, I know that Nicky is a right ol' scrubber who will grieve for a while and then get back to her old ways. Just without dear Sean. He'd been battling cancer for months, so his passing wasn't sudden or a shock. But that doesn't make it any less final or less depressing. After his diagnosis, Sean would refer to himself as a "skinny bitch" due to his dramatic weight loss. I wondered if he was aware that was a Trixie Mattel saying.
One day, I'd found some furniture on the street and was trying to drag it home. Sean ran up to help, grabbing it and single-handedly managing this dresser on the stairs in a way which would've taken me hours to do. In a world where so many frown on Alpha males, Sean was a benevolent Alpha, who used his brain and brawn to help others. A loyal friend, he once tried to hook me up with the producer of a radio show in the UK to do my own show. Sitting here crying now, and this time it ain't allergies.
Here's Sean, in all his gorgeousness, with his daughter Audrey on his left side. (I'm Aunt Bunny.) A young lady now, I bumped into her yesterday outside the shop and she seemed to be coping. And the circle of life continues.
R.I.P. Sean. You made so many of us oddballs feel welcome 'round the old avenue, and every single one of us misses you terribly. My condolences to his wife Nicky, who must be going through it like anyone who loses a loving spouse would be. Maybe even a little more, because these two made one helluva team. But Nicky will be holding court again outside Tea & Sympathy before you know it. And in Sean's honor, I'll tell the long, crappy jokes for him from now on to keep his memory alive.
A memorial is planned for May 9th. See less
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