landmarks, cont'd.

buildings can be lost so quickly, like this wonderful upjohn church on 24th st that burned in early may --- 

merchants house (ca. 1832) in the east village is a fine little house museum -- established in the 1930s by a descendant of the family that purchased it in the 1830s --- a lot of original furnishings and decoration and a great little walled garden in the rear --- i hope it survives new construction next door

morgan library

fkn love this place --- piles of real books, never mind babylonian cunieform, a mozart score, gutenberg bible, minature portraits of martin luther and his wife, houdon's cast of washington's face (1785) --- plus a spectacular 11th or 12th c reliquary with fragments of the True Cross --- the original mckim building is of course excellent

the grange and harlem

took the a line to 145th st and found hamilton's poor grange, now on its third site --- didn't go inside but talked a bit with students there from the mather building arts & craftsmanship high school, who were up there for a visit --- so fine that such a school exists

from the grange, i walked back through harlem to 91st --- much of the neighborhood is regentrifying with a vengeance, but the core of old, black harlem is still there

"walk your horses"

the last farmhouse . . .

built about 1783 to replace a residence destroyed during the revolution, it was heavily restored in 1916 --- originally part of 200+ acre farm, it is billed as the last farmhouse in manhattan --- not the greatest of house museums but the fact that it is even there is a wonderful thing 

chelsea mkt and the high line

same developer did chelsea market in nyc and ponce city mkt in atl --- similar aesthetic, but chelsea maybe a little more steampunkey --- but ponce is much bigger and has outdoor space, which the chelsea mkt doesn't, although it does have the high line that starts nearby ---

the belt line gets crowded sometimes, but i can't imagine the high line on a sunny spring weekend

nice plantings wherever that was possible but the outdoor sculpture/art was just creepy