If we all carry a customized map of the city in our minds, consider this a chance to add a few new pins to yours
Photo-Illustration: Artwork by Dmitry Maximov. Manhattan skyline source photograph by Peter Adams. For this, our 14th annual “Reasons to Love New York,” all the reasons are places — some timeless, some odd , some secret, some soothing, some technically illegal to occupy, but each beloved by the people who chose them. .
The building is so strangely shaped. Look at that! It’s a flatter Flatiron Building! It cuts Fairview Avenue in half, and this street is about one story higher than that street. And the building accounts for that. … And the Middle of the Brooklyn Bridge, Looking South Photo: Mercedeh/Stockimo /Alamy Stock Photo/Credit: Mercedeh / Stockimo / Alamy Stock Photo My best hope of attaining perspective — or at least the illusion of it — usually involves a shore or a height. The Brooklyn Bridge’s harplike cables and elevated wooden walkway make it feel like a relic of 19th-century New York — which of course it is.
Fire Lotus Temple in Boerum Hill Photo: Courtesy of Fire Lotus Zen Temple The silences are interrupted by wood blocks or different bells. But also there’s the reality of being in New York, so sometimes you’re sitting in meditation and then there’s a trap song playing outside the window. —Weston Minissali, composer for the band Erica Eso
The West Gallery at the Frick Photo: Michael Bodycomb/Courtesy of the Frick Collection/©The Frick Collection Photo credit: Michael Bodycomb Rembrandts, Vermeers, Turners, Goyas, Velázquezes, Bronzinos, all in one great open, day-lit space. And while you’re there, you can marvel that all of this at one point was a private residence. —David Zwirner, gallerist
Where Stuff Gets Caught in the Teeth of the City Photo: Will Hunt The freedom tunnel runs beneath Riverside Park for about 2.5 miles. It’s maybe 20 feet high and wide enough to fly a small plane through. It got its name from a graffiti artist called Freedom, and the walls had been covered in some of the oldest graffiti in the city. Every couple hundred feet there’s a ventilation grate in the ceiling.
Lee’s Tavern on Staten Island Photo: Katelyn Kopenhaver The island keeps getting left off the “best pizza in New York City” lists, but that’s fine by me. Leaves more for the rest of us. —Max Rose, Congressman-elect for NY-11 The Information Booth That Set Me Free Photo: Michael Lee/Getty Images/Copyright 2015 Michael Lee I was a teenager in Westchester. For a long time my mother didn’t want me to go into the city alone. Just to be able to get to the information booth — it was a beacon of liberation. It was the late ’80s. My friends and I used to call ourselves urban explorers. Which of course means trespassing. We got to the roof of Grand Central once.
Paul Deo’s Planet Harlem Mural Photo: Courtesy of Paul Deo I remember my reaction the first time I saw it. I was trying to guess who was who. Ah, there is Louis Armstrong beside Dizzy Gillespie. And then Adam Clayton Powell and Ella Fitzgerald. Seeing everybody alongside each other, you suddenly recognize just how much all these figures were entrepreneurial in their sensibility. When you’re being told you’re a second-class citizen, it takes that sensibility to forge ahead.
Between the Ladies and Gents at the Marine Air Terminal Illustration: Agnese Bicocchi The Marine air Terminal at La Guardia is right out of 1939. You can almost see Bogey smoking a cig waiting for Bacall under that model jet. You can feel the lift in the brassy, bossy Art Deco mural called Flight that wraps around the waiting area. I’ve since become an expert on all this. But I knew none of it back then.
About this time Sami came skipping in. “What are you doing, the cab’s meter is running! It’s like 50 bucks!” When we got to the airport, the very lovely couple was still standing curbside. When I saw them holding our bag, I took my first breath. When they introduced themselves, I’d like to say I shook hands like an adult human, but I think I just pushed the pair of them to the ground.
St. Mark’s Church Photo: Katelyn Kopenhaver for New York Magazine Isadora Duncan danced here, and so did Okwui Okpokwasili, and all of us learned poetry. It’s burned to the ground several times, but the place is the space — catty-corner on Second Avenue and 10th — and it reeks of what I love about New York. Speech, devastation, opportunity. —Eileen Myles, poet
The Ghost of 18th Street Whenever I’m on a 4-5-6 train headed north from Union Square, I wipe the window clean and press in close. A few seconds later, a couple of mosaics flicker by, just barely visible: 18th street. It’s one of the original stations on the IRT, built in 1904, closed in 1948, after the Union Square platform was extended northward to 16th. Nobody’s been down there since, apart from MTA workers and the odd urban spelunker .
Balthazar’s Dispensary Photo: Katelyn Kopenhaver for New York Magazine In the winter, I sometimes go blocks out of my way so I can stop by the little shop attached to Balthazar. A friend brought me there years ago for hot ginger tea in a to-go cup. The warmth flows through me as I continue on my way. —Claudia Rankine, poet
The Street That Is a Skater’s Highway Photo: Katelyn Kopenhaver for New York Magazine I start the day hanging out at Labor Skateboard shop and end it at Tompkins Square Park, the best flat-ground spot in New York. Essex is a smooth ride between — just pushing in and out of cars, you can go from the Lower East Side to East Village in seven minutes. —Beatrice Domond, pro skateboarder
Columbus Circle Subway Station Photo: Gryffindor via Wikipedia Favorite place: It’s my home subway station, so there’s a familiarity with every staircase and exit. I love that Whole Foods and Central Park — my second and third favorite places in the city — are right outside and that from there you can access so many different neighborhoods in a matter of minutes … as long as the trains are on time.
The Endangered Garden on Elizabeth Street Photo: Patti McConville/Alamy/Credit: Patti McConville / Alamy Stock Photo When I first got hired at HQ in the summer of 2017, I moved into an absurdly expensive fifth-floor walk-up “economy” in Nolita to be closer to the studio. The silver lining to that apartment — besides being able to scramble eggs from the toilet — was discovering this quirky urban oasis across the street.
Corner of 57th and Fifth I worked at a boutique called Lothar’s. I learned about big city life; I met remarkable people; and I sold my very first collection to Bergdorf Goodman. That corner has been very good to me. And Bill Cunningham was there to capture the magic of that corner for me and so many other people. —Michael Kors
I’m pretty much the only person who climbs that tower. What I like about it is it has all the significance in the world but it has a humility about it because it’s sort of secret. —Bill Dilworth, caretaker of The New York Earth Room A Table for Four at Le Zie We occupy the same table every Thursday for dinner. The owner, Claudio, is the most delightful man, and the food is first-rate. —Milton Glaser, graphic designer
Under the Seats at SNL I waited there when I was “on deck” for my SNL audition, and I like to walk through to remember that feeling. —Aidy Bryant
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