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Lower East Side

Photo Credit: Jeff Greenberg/NYC & Company, Inc.

If you like your neighborhoods a little grittier, the Lower East Side might be the place for you. Originally, the area was home to Russian and Polish Jews, who began inhabiting it in the 1880s. The tenement living that resulted from the influx of poor immigrants set the tone for the area. Although it’s moving toward gentrification, the Lower East Side’s reputation for being rundown and unsafe is still somewhat deserved. That being said, it does have its advantages.

Once the largest Jewish community in the world, the neighborhood still is thought of as a landmark Jewish district. It’s a great place to get a pastrami sandwich or to eat fresh pickles out of a barrel. New York’s oldest and largest deli, Katz’s Delicatessen, opened in 1888 and still is located here. Another neighborhood fixture is Ratner’s, a bagel shop that has been in the area since the early 1900s. In more recent times, French bistros and Cuban and Puerto Rican restaurants have opened here, expanding the neighborhood’s cultural mix.

The Lower East Side also is the birthplace of New York’s garment district, which now has morphed into a multi-cultural marketplace. The diverse stores range from trendy boutiques to Spanish bodegas to dry goods discounters to a large flea market that takes place on Orchard Street every Sunday. Neighborhood housing is comprised mainly of apartments and co-ops. There are seven public housing projects that contain thousands of low-cost apartments and many co-ops, some of which have spectacular river views. Some of these units are in the process of renovation and gentrification. As with Harlem, there is concern that with renewal comes displacement of people who can’t afford the rents in an upwardly mobile neighborhood.

Although the Lower East Side is a neighborhood in its own right, it’s also a geographical description. The following distinct neighborhoods also can be found in this area, which is located on Manhattan’s eastern tip:

Chinatown
Little Italy
NoHo
NoLita

View healthcare facilities on the Lower East Side <anchor to links below>

Chinatown

This unique area of New York has the distinction of being America’s largest Chinatown, as well as the home of the greatest concentration of Chinese people outside of Asia. An obvious destination for Chinese immigrants, the estimated population of up to 150,000 also includes people from Korea, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Puerto Rico, Burma, and the Philippines.

When you’re here—more so than in just about any other New York neighborhood—there’s a feeling of being transported to another world. The many signs in Chinese, the scent of exotic food, and the sound of different languages spoken by vendors who hawk their wares on the two square miles of winding streets leaves no doubt as to which neighborhood you’re in. But although many of Chinatown’s buildings are older tenements, the rents in Chinatown are some of the highest in the city. This is due to the small amount of space and the high desirability of the neighborhood.

While most people would find everyday life interesting in Chinatown, there also are a few special points of interest. The Eastern States Buddhist Temple on Mott Street contains 100 golden Buddha statues, which are a sight to see as they shimmer in the temple’s candlelight. There also are frequent festivals and parades, including the Chinese New Year Parade, complete with firecrackers and costumed-dragon dancers who dance to scare away “evil spirits.”

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Little Italy

Just around the corner from Chinatown, but clearly a world away, lies Little Italy. Its cobblestone streets link turn-of-the-century tenement apartments, co-ops, Italian eateries and bakeries, and a few shops that cater to tourists and residents. If you’ve never been to Little Italy and want a glimpse, just watch the movie, The Godfather; some of its scenes were shot here. Although its mean-streets image has faded in recent years, and there are actually more Chinese people living here than Italians, there still is a unique ambience to the area.

Aside from its cinematic prominence and the genuine feeling of Old Italy that it invokes, the neighborhood is best known for the Feast of San Gennaro, which has taken place here every year since 1926. Every September, the festival takes over the section of Mulberry Street between Canal and Houston Streets. In fact, Mulberry Street is renamed Via San Gennaro for the duration of the celebration. Carnival games, parades, a cannoli-eating contest, lots of Italian food, and a blessing of the vendors and merchants by priests from the Most Precious Blood Church are all part of this festival that celebrates Saint Gennaro, the patron saint of Naples.

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NoHo

NoHo derives its name from “North of Houston Street” and it’s relatively new as far as New York neighborhoods go. Formerly part of the warehouse district, the area was renamed as artists began moving into its lofts to take advantage of the natural light and low rents during the 1970s and 1980s. Also a historic district, NoHo contains a rich supply of architecturally interesting buildings. Most of the buildings were built between 1850 and 1910 and were designed to impress customers with ornate finery in the front, while still allowing for easy handling of goods in the rear.

Today’s NoHo plays host to galleries, coffee shops, and offbeat shops, and of course, up-and-comers who can afford the high price tags for co-ops, walk-ups, and lofts in its historic buildings. Although not fully developed, the area’s proximity to the more gentrified and established neighborhoods around it makes it desirable.

If you’d like to catch a glimpse of NoHo on film, look for the “Cynthia Griffin Swan Crisis Center for Women” in the film, The First Wives Club. Bond Street in NoHo was the site of this fictional social service center.

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NoLita

Like NoHo, NoLita (“North of Little Italy”) is a neighborhood on the rise—both in price and stature. The neighborhood used to be reasonably priced and home to mom-and-pop pizzerias and stores until the mid-1990s when designers discovered it and began opening their boutiques here. Now trendy stores and eateries coexist along with some of the more tenacious small businesses that have been in the neighborhood for decades. Although the area is hailed as the next SoHo, it’s still more affordable than its hip neighbor to the west. Indeed, some SoHo retailers and residents are being drawn to NoLita by the lower rents for storefronts, co-ops, apartments, and condominiums, which is helping to fuel the area’s upward trend.

NoLita is centered around St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral, which was built in 1809 and was the precurser to the current St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue. The cathedral achieved some fame as the boyhood parish of Martin Scorcese, and was used as the backdrop for several films in the Godfather series, as well as several other movies.

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Healthcare facilities on the Lower East Side:

Beth Israel Medical Center–Singer Division
Gouverneur Healthcare Services