New York City may seem like a curious place to go looking to see gorse, the small shrub that thrives in rural fields and along hillsides, its yellow flowers rippling across the countryside in spring. But there’s at least one sure place I’ve enjoyed the sight of it in New York – the Irish Hunger […]
Entries Tagged as 'Explore New York'
Springtime at the Irish Hunger Memorial
April 15th, 2009 · 1 Comment · Explore New York
Tags: landscape architecture·manhattan·nature·new york·spiritual places
The Place That Powered the Subway Lines
March 29th, 2009 · 4 Comments · Explore New York
Its architecture and ornate decoration reflect the City Beautiful movement, in which public buildings were expressions of a city’s beauty, order, and harmony. Yet it had a belly-of-the-beast interior containing massive boilers, conveyors, engines, steam pipes, and seven bunkers capable of holding up to 18,000 tons of coal. The Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT) Company Powerhouse […]
Tags: architecture·cities·historic preservation·manhattan·midtown·new york·terra cotta
Wanna Buy an Art Deco Gem? Ask AIG
March 20th, 2009 · 11 Comments · Explore New York
When corporate kingdoms fall, they often lose their castles. That may well be the case with AIG. The bailout-dependent conglomerate that has made “bonus rage” a media catchphrase said Wednesday that it’s considering the sale of its legendary 66-story headquarters at 70 Pine Street in Lower Manhattan, Bloomberg confirmed. Like other assets that the American […]
Coney Island’s Off-Season Vibe
March 8th, 2009 · 3 Comments · Explore New York
Scrawled on the cornice of a dilapidated building on Coney Island’s Surf Avenue is “Shore Hotel. Nature’s Paradise By the Sea.” But paradise this isn’t. On Coney Island’s main thoroughfare, it sits in the midst of a mish-mash of garish-colored patches of buildings, “Stores for Lease” signs, boarded-up windows, and neon that heralds “Eldorado Auto […]
Tags: Brooklyn·cities·Coney Island·new york
Whose Dreams Will Revive Coney Island?
February 27th, 2009 · 81 Comments · Be a Mindful Activist, Explore New York
Say the words “Coney Island” to New Yorkers, especially of a certain age, and you may well get a dreamy kind of pause and a vivid memory: feeling the sensation of a drop on the Cyclone roller coaster, seeing the steel top on the gigantic Parachute Jump from the distance, riding the fast Steeplechase horses, […]
Vertical Cities: Hong Kong and New York
January 29th, 2009 · 8 Comments · Explore New York
Sometimes in a sea of numbers, it takes just one stat to astound you into getting the picture: In one of the New Towns of Hong Kong, Tseung Kwan O, some 350,000 people live within four square miles. They live in towers that vary from 57 to 62 stories. Here’s another stat: 80 percent of […]
Tags: architecture·Asia·cities·international·manhattan·museums·new york
Prayers and Peace at St. Francis
January 6th, 2009 · 8 Comments · Explore New York
Outside, it was a post-Christmas, rush-hour frenzy, throngs crowding near the revolving doors and the holiday windows of Macy’s or walking speedily to Penn Station. Inside St. Francis of Assisi Roman Catholic Church in New York in the midst of all of this, you’d never know it. Two men were slowly and carefully placing flowers […]
Tags: architecture·art·cities·landmarks·manhattan·midtown·spiritual places·terra cotta
Manhattan’s Dyckman Farmhouse
December 15th, 2008 · 8 Comments · Explore New York
In a world where teens hang out for hours in their bedrooms playing video games and a household may have three or four computers and several TVs, consider the parlor of Jacobus Dyckman. In the early 19th century, Dyckman’s family, servants, and one slave – up to 10 people – would likely have confined many […]
Winter Colors in Central Park
December 6th, 2008 · 3 Comments · Explore New York
For the eyes that glory in autumn’s rich, awe-inspiring colors or spring’s bright exuberance, winter may feel like the ho-hum season, one big letdown. To many, it’s “dreary” winter, a time to hunker down inside and hang on until the color in the Northern climes “returns” to the trees, bushes, and flowerbeds come spring. Yet […]
Tags: Central Park·nature·new york·seasons
Still Missing McHale’s
November 30th, 2008 · 25 Comments · Explore New York
In some ways, buildings are like people. They have a birth and a prime of life. As they age, they either wear well or not. They’re either cherished and well cared for, or neglected. The lives of some buildings are cut short way too soon. Others seem to thrive year upon year upon year. Still […]
Tags: cities·historic preservation·manhattan·midtown·new york·taverns
How to Stay Merry Before Christmas
November 23rd, 2008 · 2 Comments · Explore New York
Ah, the lovely holiday season in New York City is upon us. It means bright, colorful lights, enchanting holiday windows, the Rockefeller Center tree, the smell of pine in front of your corner deli…and gridlock. We’re talking vehicle gridlock and people gridlock. That’s exactly what happens in New York as Thanksgiving rounds into the crazed, […]
Tags: Central Park·cities·holidays·midtown·museums·nature·new york
Bowery Savings: The World in a Building
November 11th, 2008 · 101 Comments · Explore New York
Tinos green marble is a vivid green-blue with wide white veins, mined from the quarries of a small mountainous Greek island in the Aegean Sea. Briar Hill sandstone is an earthy stone of warm red, rust, brown, and buff-colored tones taken from quarries in Glenmont, Ohio. Missouri is the source of Napoleon gray marble, while […]
Tags: architecture·art·landmarks·manhattan·midtown·new york·stone
Pecks and the City: My Sparrow Friends
November 2nd, 2008 · 2 Comments · Explore New York
Birders glory in having spotted a Tennessee warbler in Central Park, and I would, too, if I was fortunate and plucky enough to see one. But day-to-day, this New Yorker exults in the sparrows of Hell’s Kitchen. They chirp and call locally outside our apartment window every morning. Happily, it seems. Sparrows are to 6 […]
Tags: birds·Central Park·manhattan·nature·new york
Architects With the Right Touch
October 28th, 2008 · 3 Comments · Explore New York
H. Douglas Ives once placed swarms of bees in the midst of midtown Manhattan, but to inspire, not to sting. High above the thousands who scurry and stroll along Fifth Avenue sit two beehives surrounded by buzzing bees. But they’re not live – they’re part of the dazzling decoration atop the Fred F. French Building […]
Tags: architecture·art deco·cities·french building·landmarks·manhattan·midtown·new york·terra cotta
