Good Ol'EV

The East Village’s history is built in the footsteps of diversity. It dates back to the seventeenth century when it was the farm of Peter Stuyvesant. It transformed to immigrant communities as New York City expanded northward during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In the 1950s and ‘60s, the East Village was the center of counter-culture movements like the beatniks and hippies. Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac partied and penned here. Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, the Ramones and countless others rocked the Bowery and St. Marks. Until recently, when the East Village became so gentrified that many of the apartments became so expensive, the area was home to next-generation hippies, mods, beatniks and other followers of various counter-cultures. Today it is home to residents and visitors who come to revel in this ever-changing neighborhood. In a nutshell, it is an area of 15 blocks by 7 avenues of intellectuals, artists, hobos, old-timers and weirdoes – a veritable hodge-podge of people, ethnicities, histories and interests.

This is the place to be. From students to celebrities, everyone lusts after an East Village address. And why shouldn’t they? Second Avenue is lined with bars and the cafes only become funkier and more bohemian the further east in to the Alphabets you go. Where else is it acceptable to go sake bombing at noon on a Tuesday or play bluegrass on the fiddle at the corner of Second Avenue and St. Marks outside the Washington Mutual?

This is the neighborhood where one night you can have a $1 slice of pizza at Two Bros. on St. Marks, and drop $50 the next at Kanoyama Sushi on Second Avenue and 11th Street.

And for those who aren’t all about the non-stop party, there is still plenty to do. The area is the birthplace of New York’s community gardens, developed by Liz Christy in the 1970s. La Plaza Cultural on Avenue C and 9th Street. is an example. It is the only place in Manhattan that has weeping willow trees, due to a reservoir that flows beneath the street.

It really doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from. Most people in the area aren’t from here anyway. The East Village has something for everyone. Take a trip through time walking down Stuyvesant Street (the road that led to Peter’s farm) or listen for Joey Ramone’s ghost mumbling about sedation outside the shell of CBGBs. Imagine Ginsberg walking down the Bowery dreaming up his Indian Journals. Or buy a vintage clutch and sit in the park while eating a falafel. Whatever your pleasure, you will find solace and adventure in the East Village.