I have not been able to format this blog as I would like to see it, so I am abandoning it.  I may start another blog on a different platform.

A colorful building

There are a lot of red and white buildings in New York City, with the ubiquity of brick and limestone, but few look as much like a candy cane as this one at 59 Second  Avenue, between 3rd and 4th streets.  It was designed in 1903 by George F. Pelham, a prolific architect of his time.  This building, is a new-law (1901) tenement,  which meant, among other things, that each apartment had running water and a toilet and each room had a window.

Across the street from Anthology Film Archives

Anthology Film …

Anthology Film Archives is located in the former Second Avenue Courthouse, the third venue for the organization, on the corner of Second Avenue and Second Street.    A wide variety of experimental, independent and classic films can be seen here, under the artistic direction of Jonas Mekas, one of the the founders.

NYC at one time had several  neighborhood courthouses, the Jefferson Market courthouse (now Library) being another, and probably the most well-known.  This building is within the boundaries of a proposed East Village Historic District.  If it had already been a designated landmark, chances are that the windows would not have been boarded up in quite the same way.

 

 

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The right subway exit

IMG_0966, a photo by Sandra Levine on Flickr.

To start at the beginning, I exited the F train at the Second Avenue stop.

As I was saying….

This blog is a continuation of one that I maintained for a couple of years on Blogspot,
“Walks in New York and Elsewhere.”  The last post on that blog was dated 2007.  Yesterday, as I was walking down Second Avenue and noticing the many changes in the blocks from East 63rd to East 3rd Street, since 1965, the urge came over me to start blogging again.   My inability to revive the old blog (too boring to go into, involving a defunct e-mail address) led me to WordPress.  Anyone who would like to see the earlier entries can link to the old blog here:  http://newyorkandelsewhere.blogspot.com/

The earlier blog recording my impressions of buildings, stores and anything else that caught my eye as I walked on one street or avenue at a time.  These were not walking tours, but informal documentation  of the way one particular street changed along its length and reflected the various neighborhoods it traversed.    I intend to allow myself more flexibility in “New Walks…” but my first posts will follow the original format, with a walk on Second Avenue, beginning at Houston Street, moving north.   I’m not sure when I’ll start the walk, but it will be soon.  I’ll post as I go, because it’s a long street, and I want to get started.