St. Mark's Place is considered a main cultural street for theEast Village. Vehicular traffic runs east along bothone-way streets. St. Mark's Place features a wide variety of retailers. Venerable institutions lining St. Mark's Place have includedGem Spa and the St. Mark's Hotel. There are several open-front markets that sell sunglasses, clothing, and jewelry. In her 400-year history of St. Mark's Place (St. Marks Is Dead),Ada Calhoun called the street "like superglue for fragmented identities" and wrote that "the street is not for people who have chosen their lives ... [it] is for the wanderer, the undecided, the lonely, and the promiscuous."[3]
TheCommissioners' Plan of 1811 defined the street grid for much of Manhattan. According to the plan, 8th Street was to run from Greenwich Lane (now Greenwich Avenue) in the west toFirst Avenue on the east.[5][6] The area west of Greenwich Lane was already developed asGreenwich Village, while the area east of First Avenue was reserved for a wholesale food market.
The plan was amended many times as the grid took shape and public spaces were added or eliminated. The marketplace proposal was scrapped in 1824, allowing 8th Street to continue eastward to the river.[7] On the west side,Sixth Avenue was extended and Greenwich Lane shortened, shifting the boundary of 8th Street, ever so slightly, to Sixth Avenue and allowingMercer, Greene,Wooster and MacDougal Streets to continue northward to 8th.[8][9]
After the Commissioners' Plan was laid out, property along the street's right of way quickly developed. By 1835, theNew York University opened its first building, the Silver Center, along Eighth Street near the Washington Square Park.Row houses were also built on Eighth Street. The street ran between theJefferson Market, built in 1832 at the west end, and the Tompkins Market, built in 1836, at the east end. These were factors in the street's commercialization in later years.[4]
Eighth Street was supposed to extend to a market place atAvenue C, but that idea never came to fruition. Capitalizing on the high-class status of Bond,Bleecker,Great Jones, andLafayette Streets inNoHo, developer Thomas E. Davis developed the east end of the street and renamed it "St. Mark's Place" in 1835.[10] Davis built up St. Mark's Place between Third and Second Avenues between 1831 and 1832. Although the original plan was forFederal homes, only three such houses remained in 2014.[10]
Meanwhile, Eighth Street became home to a literary scene. At Astor Place and Eighth Street, theAstor Opera House was built by wealthy men and opened in 1847.[11] PublisherEvert Augustus Duyckinck founded a private library at his 50 East Eighth Street home. Anne Lynch started a famous literary salon at 116Waverly Place and relocated to 37 West Eighth Street in 1848.[4] Around this time and up until the 1890s, Eighth Street was co-named Clinton Place in memory of politicianDeWitt Clinton, whose widow lived along nearbyUniversity Place.[4]
In the 1850s, Eighth Street housed an educational scene as well. TheCooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, a then-free institution for art, architecture and engineering education, was opened in 1858. TheCentury Club, an arts and letters association, relocated to 46 East Eighth Street around that time; the Bible House of theAmerican Bible Society, was nearby. In addition, the Brevoort Hotel, as well as a marble mansion built byJohn Taylor Johnston, were erected at Fifth Avenue and Eighth Street.[4]
At the same time, German immigrants moved into the area aroundTompkins Square Park. The area around St. Mark's Place was nicknamedKleindeutschland, or "Little Germany", because of a huge influx of German immigrants in the 1840s and 1850s. Many of the homes turned intoboarding houses, as the area had 50,000 residents but not a lot of real estate.Tenement housing was also built on St. Mark's Place.[10]
By the 1870s, apartments replaced stables and houses along the stretch of Eighth Street west of MacDougal Street. The elevatedThird andSixth Avenue Lines were also built during that time, with stops along the former atNinth Street and along the latter atEighth Street.[4][10]
At the southwest corner of Broadway and Eighth Street, the street's first commercial building was built. By the 1890s, buildings on the stretch from Bowery to Fifth Avenue were used for trade.[4] In 1904, theWanamaker's Department Store opened at the formerA.T. Stewart store along Broadway between 9th and 10th Streets, with an annex built at Eighth Street.[4]
In the early 1900s, Little Germany was shrinking. At the same time, Jews, Hungarians, Poles, Ukrainians, and Russians from Eastern Europe started moving in. In 1916, members of theSlovenian community andFranciscans established theSlovenian Church of St. Cyril, which still operates.[12] At this point, St. Mark's Place was considered a part of theLower East Side.[10]
On the western stretch of Eighth Street, an art scene was growing.Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney,Daniel Chester French, and other artists moved in the stables at MacDougal Alley at this time. By 1916, a studio complex for artists replaced most of these stables, making the areas around Eighth Street popular forbohemians. Whitney, a patron for other American painters, combined four houses on West Eighth Street houses into theWhitney Museum in 1931.[4]
The 1927 construction of the skyscraper atOne Fifth Avenue, as well as theEighth Street Playhouse movie theater, helped influence development on the Sixth Avenue end of the street, where construction of theIND Eighth Avenue Line had required destruction of many buildings there.[4] On an adjoining block, theWomen's House of Detention was built in Jefferson Market complex in 1929–1932 and existed through the 1970s.[4]
In the 1930s, afterProhibition ended, West Eighth Street became an entertainment area. Around that time, theNew York School movement forabstract expressionist painters was centered around Eighth Street, with many such painters moving to Eighth Street.[4]
AfterWorld War II, property along 8th Street was converted to apartment houses. The Rhinelander Estate, one of the major landowners on Eighth Street, erected a building between Washington Square North, Fifth Avenue, West Eighth Street, and the Whitney Museum site. Sailor's Snug Harbor, the other major land owner, demolished the blocks from Fifth Avenue to Broadway on the north side of Eighth and Ninth Streets, including the popular Brevoort Hotel. It replaced these blocks mainly with low-rise apartment buildings and stores, as well as twohigh-rises.[4] Around this time, West Eighth Street was also becoming the location of neighborhood commerce.[4]
After the elevated train lines were demolished in the 1940s and 1950s, the real estate industry tried to entice residents to the St. Mark's Place area, describing the neighborhood as "East Village". This area became home to an underground scene, and as it was far from public transportation, it became rundown. A 1965Newsweek article described the East Village by telling readers to "head east fromGreenwich Village, and when it starts to look squalid, around the Bowery and Third Avenue, you know you're there."[10]
In the 1960s, Macdougal and West Eighth Streets, as well as St. Mark's Place, became a popular area forhippies.[10] A women's clothing store, a pharmacy, and bookstores were replaced byfast food restaurants and other shops, directed toward the area's tourism base.[4] By 1968, St, Mark's Place became a stopping point fortour buses, which formerly skipped the area.[10]
In 1977, St. Marks Place became the epicenter ofpunk rock, whenManic Panic opened its doors on July 7, 1977 (7/7/77).[13] The shop quickly attracted musicians from Cyndi Lauper to the Ramones.[14]
In 1980, hot dog companyNathan's Famous moved into the location of a former bookstore on Eighth Street, to the anger of some Greenwich Village residents. However, other establishments, such as theB. Dalton bookstore, clothing stores, and shoe stores, started to attract tourists to the area.[4] By the 1990s, the areas around both Eighth Street and St. Mark's Place were becoming rapidlygentrified, with new buildings and establishments being developed along both streets.[10] The Village Alliance Business Improvement District was formed in 1993 to care for the area around Eighth Street.[4]
Thestucco-faced apartment building at 4–26 East 8th Street between Fifth Avenue andUniversity Place was built in 1834–36 and remodeled in 1916. It was designed byHarvey Wiley Corbett, and has been described as a "stage set, symbolic of the 'village' of a bohemian artist."[16]
The residential apartment building atOne Fifth Avenue, on the southeast corner of East 8th Street, was built in 1929 and was designed by Helme, Corbett & Harrison and Sugarman & Berger. The brown brick building features numerousstep-backs,battlements,buttresses and other suggestions of medieval architecture.[16]
The full-block building on 8th Street bordered byLafayette Street,9th Street andBroadway, which carries the addresses 499 Lafayette Avenue and 770 Broadway, was built in 1902 to be the Annex for the giantJohn Wanamaker's Department Store located one block north between 9th and10th Streets. The two buildings were connected by a skybridge over 9th Street which was dubbed the "Bridge of Progress".[17][18] The main store was destroyed by fire in 1955, but the Annex building remains, and features retail space as well as offices.
Across the street, also between Lafayette Street and Broadway, 8th Street runs behind Clinton Hall at 13 Astor Place, also known as 21 Astor Place. This was once the site of theAstor Opera House outside of which theAstor Place Riot occurred. The Opera House opened in 1847 and closed in 1890 to be replaced by the current building, designed byGeorge E. Harney, which became the site of theNew York Mercantile Library. The library left the 11-story building in 1932, and it has since been a union headquarters (District 65 of the Distributive Workers of America), the Astor Place Hotel, and, as of 1995, condominiums.[19][20]
The three former 1838 row houses at 8–12 West 8th Street between Fifth Avenue andMacdougal Street in Greenwich Village were converted in 1931 by Auguste L. Noel of Noel & Miller into the first home of theWhitney Museum of American Art, which sculptor and heiressGertrude Vanderbilt Whitney had established in 1929, after theMetropolitan Museum of Art rejected the donation of her extensive collection of contemporary andavant-garde artworks. In 1914, Whitney had started the Whitney Studio at 8 West 8th Street, just behind her own studio on MacDougal Alley. The museum was located here until 1954, when it moved uptown. The building is currently, along with 14 West 8th Street (built in 1900), theNew York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture.[21]
Hamilton-Holly House (#4) was part of the same 1830s development as...
#2 – Beginning in 1962 it housedThe Five-Spot, one of the city's leadingjazz clubs. Innovators such asThelonious Monk,Charlie Parker andCharles Mingus all appeared there. It later became "The Late Show", a vintage clothing store that was popularized by theNew York Dolls and owned by their valet, Frenchie.[23] Punk rockerGG Allin also lived in the building at some point.[24]
#4 – The Hamilton-Holly House was built in 1831 byThomas E. Davis and sold to ColonelAlexander Hamilton, the son ofAlexander Hamilton, firstSecretary of the Treasury, in 1833.[25] From 1843 to 1863 it was owned by Isaac C. Van Wyck, the candle and oil merchant. The building was owned from 1863 to 1903 by butter merchant John W. Miller, who added a two-story addition and a meeting hall on the first floor. From 1901 until 1952 the building was owned by the C. Meisel company, a manufacturer of musical instruments. Between 1955 and 1967 it housed the Tempo Playhouse, New Bowery Theatre, and Bridge Theatre, noted for experimental theater, music, dance, and independent film.[25] In 1964 it housed the New Bowery Theatre, a showcase for the American Theatre of Poets. In 1965, the theater drew official attention for screeningFlaming Creatures, a controversial film by Jack Smith, which depicted provocative scenes and was seized by the police. The organizer, Jonas Mekas, was arrested, and the film was labeled “obscene” by the court. Jonas Mekas went on to found the Anthology Film Archives, a center dedicated to preserving and showcasing independent, experimental, and avant-garde cinema. In 1979, it found a permanent home in a former courthouse at 32 Second Avenue.[26] From 1967 it housed theLimbo boutique, which in 1975 was sold to Ray Goodman who openedTrash and Vaudeville, a punk clothing store[23][27] that operated in that location until 2016. The building was designated aNew York City landmark in 2004.[22]
#6 – TheModern School, founded in 1901 inBarcelona byFrancesco Ferrer, opened a New York branch here in January 1911. It was led by anarchistsEmma Goldman andAlexander Berkman, who founded the Francisco Ferrer Association in 1910, "to perpetuate the work and memory of Francisco Ferrer", who had been executed in October 1909 for plotting to killAlfonso XIII, the King of Spain, and masterminding the events ofTragic Week, a mass riot in and around Barcelona.[28] Beginning in 1913 the building housed the Saint Mark's Russian and Turkish Baths. In 1979 the building was renovated and renamed theNew St. Marks Baths, a gay bath house.[29] The New Saint Marks Baths was closed by the New York City Department of Health in 1985, due to concerns of HIV transmission. The building subsequently housedMondo Kim's from 1995 until early 2009. Since 2014, the building has been home to one aBarcade location.
#8 – The New York Cooking School, founded byJuliet Corson in 1876, was the country's first cooking school. It figured prominently in the city's first knownMafiahit in Manhattan, the 1888 killing of Antonio Flaccomio, when it was La Triniria Italian Restaurant. The killer dined there with his victim, then stabbed him a few blocks away.[23]
#11 – Home toShulamith Firestone, feminist, activist, author ofThe Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution andAirless Spaces, in the seventies and eighties. The storefront at the top of the stairs was the original location ofSt. Mark's Comics, which opened in May 1983. In 1993, the store moved directly downstairs to the storefront beneath the original location. The downstairs storefront operated through February 2019 when the location closed[30][31] before relocating to Brooklyn in 2021.[32]
#12 – Designed by William C. Frohne and built in 1885, as the clubhouse for theDeutsch-Amerikanische Schützen Gesellschaft (German-American Shooting Society). The facade saysEinigkeit macht stark (Unity is strength). The building is a remnant ofKleindeutschland (Little Germany), the home of many German immigrants from the mid-19th Century until theGeneral Slocum disaster of June 15, 1904.[33] The building was designated as alandmark in 2001.[22] In the late seventies it housed The New Cinema, featuring film and video by independent filmmakers, includingEric Mitchell, Anders Grafstrom,Scott and Beth B,Jim Jarmusch, Charles Ahearn andAmos Poe.
#15 – Former location of "Paul McGregor's Haircutter." McGregor was known for inventing theshag, which he gave toJane Fonda. Other customers wereWarren Beatty,Goldie Hawn andFaye Dunaway. Supposedly, Beatty's filmShampoo was based on McGregor.[34][35] From 1995 to 1999, the building was home to Coney Island High, a live punk rock music venue co-founded byD Generation singer,Jesse Malin, and notable for being the location ofNo Doubt's first New York City performance in November 1995.
#19–25 – As Arlington Hall, this was the site of a 1914 shootout between "Dopey"Benny Fein's Jewish gang andJack Sirocco's Italian mob, an event that marked the beginning of the predominance of theItalian Americangangsters over theJewish American gangsters. Arlington Hall also had some notable speakers including Police CommissionerTheodore Roosevelt (1895) andWilliam Randolph Hearst (1905). The building later housed the Dom Restaurant, with its well-known Stanley's Bar – whereThe Fugs played in the mid-1960s –Andy Warhol andPaul Morrissey turned The Dom into a nightclub in 1966, which served as a showcase for theExploding Plastic Inevitable, Warhol's multimedia stage show for theVelvet Underground. In early 1967, the Dom morphed yet again into The Balloon Farm. Later that year, the lease was transferred to Brandt Freeman International, LTD, and renamed theElectric Circus.[36] The building also served as the second location for theCBGB Fashions retail store from November 2006 through June 2008.[37]
#28 – From 1967 to 1971, this storefront housed Underground Uplift Unlimited (UUU), which created and sold some of the most noteworthy protest buttons and posters of era, including "Make Love Not War."[23]
#33 – Home to poetAnne Waldman in the late 1960s/mid-1970s. In 1977, the storefront was occupied byManic Panic, the first U.S. boutique to sell punk rock attire, which developed its own line of make-up and vibrant hair dyes;[23] notable patrons have included performersDavid Bowie,Cyndi Lauper,Debbie Harry, andJoey Ramone. One of the building's two storefronts was used to portray Ray's Occult Books for an exterior shot seen in the 1989 filmGhostbusters II.
#34 – Location of the East Side Bookstore, 1960s–1980s.
#60 – Building constructed in 1920; later location of the spacious studio apartment ofabstract expressionist painterJoan Mitchell, where she lived and painted from 1951 to 1957.[23]
#62 – The Roman CatholicSlovenian church of St. Cyril, New York is a Franciscan mission serving the Slovenian community of the New York City area. The parish was founded in 1916 with the purchase of this brownstone. For the 80th anniversary of the parish, the narrow church was repaired and the interior redesigned by architect Eduardo Lacroze with sculptures by Bogdan Grom. The parish hostsSlovenian language classes and monthly Slovenian cultural events after Sunday Mass.[23]
#66 – Location of St. Mark's Hospital of New York City in operation from 1890 to 1931.[40]
#77 – Home toW. H. Auden for almost 20 years.[41] The basement of this building was the location where the newspaperNovy Mir ("New World" or "New Peace"), a Russian-language Communist paper, was founded in 1916. It was edited byNikolai Ivanovich Bukharin, andLeon Trotsky worked there; the paper stopped publishing after theRussian Revolution of October 1917.[42]
#80 – Home ofLeon Trotsky.[42] Theatre 80[44] saw the premiere ofYou're a Good Man, Charlie Brown in 1967. Formerly the Jazz Gallery, site of the last performance byLord Buckley. Now also the home of The Exhibition of the American Gangster, a museum of the American Gangster.[45]
#101 – From the mid-1970s to 1983, the poetsTed Berrigan andAlice Notley, who were married to each other, lived here. In Berrigan's "The Last Poem", he wrote: "101 St. Mark's Place, apt. 12A, NYC 10009/ New York. Friends appeared & disappeared, or wigged out/ Or stayed; inspiring strangers sadly died; everyone/ I ever knew aged tremendously, except me."[41]
#105 – Early 1860s home ofUriah P. Levy, the first Jewish commodore of theU.S. Navy and who was also known for purchasingMonticello to work toward its restoration and preservation.
#122 – Former location ofSin-é, a neighborhood café whereJeff Buckley performed a regular spot on Monday nights. Other musicians such asDavid Gray andKatell Keineg also performed there. Sin-é closed in the mid-1990s.[52]
#132 – Known at the time as St. Mark's Bar and Grill, this is the second location on the street to be used in the "Waiting on a Friend" video by the Rolling Stones. After several business changes at the address, a Rolling Stones-themed bar named Waiting on a Friend opened at the location in September 2018. However, by October 2019, the bar had permanently closed.[53][54]
Gem Spa was the "corner store" for locals for nearly a century before closing due to financial hardship during theCOVID-19 pandemic.Cherries, an adult store on St. Mark's Place whose signage was part ofSaturday Night Live's opening montage. The store closed in late 2011.
St. Mark's Place appears in a variety of works in popular culture. Notable examples include:
In the video for The Rolling Stones's "Waiting on a Friend", Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, and Peter Tosh are seen sitting on the stoop of 96–98 St. Mark's Place before Jagger and Richards walk to St. Mark's Bar and Grill at 132 St. Mark's Place to meet and perform with the rest of the band. In the song, Jagger mentions 8th Street.
On the back cover of the firstNew York Dolls LP, the band is pictured standing in front ofGem Spa, a newspaper, magazine and tobacco store, which was known for its fountainegg creams, located on the southwest corner of St. Mark's Place and Second Avenue, at 131 Second Avenue.[55][56]
The narrator ofTom Paxton's "Talking Vietnam Potluck Blues", upon smellingmarijuana on someone's breath during theVietnam War remarks, "He smelled like midnight on St. Mark's Place."
The Holy Modal Rounders mentioned the street in their song "Bad Boy" in the lyric "he'll sell your heart on St. Mark's Place in glassine envelopes/he'll cut it with a pig's heart, and burn the chumps and dopes".
Earl Slick's 2003 solo albumZig-Zag features a song called "Saint Mark's Place".
InLou Reed's song "Sally Can't Dance", Sally walks down and lives on St. Mark's Place (in arent controlled apartment).
In theKing Missile song "Detachable Penis" vocalistJohn S. Hall states, "Then, as I walked down Second Avenue towards St. Mark's Place / Where all those people sell used books and other junk on the street / I saw my penis lying on a blanket next to a broken toaster oven."
The albumWe Are Only Riders by TheJeffrey Lee Pierce Sessions Project features a song called "Saint Mark's Place", a duet withLydia Lunch.
The music video forBilly Joel's 1986 song "A Matter of Trust" was shot in the Electric Circus building and features extensive footage of the block.
The Replacements' 1987 song "Alex Chilton" contains the line, "Checkin' his stash by the trash at St. Mark's Place."
Moe's song "New York City" contains the line, "Hits his brakes and points out the freaks on St. Mark's Place."
Kirsty McGee'sFrost album (2004) contains a song called "Saint Mark's Place".
TheTom Waits song "Potter's Field" from hisForeign Affairs album contains the line "You'll learn why liquor makes astool pigeon rat on every face that ever left his shadow down on St. Mark's Place."
TheRank and File song "I Went Walking", on their 1982 albumSundown, presents a cynical look at the St. Mark's Place of that time, containing the lines: "Have you ever seen a sheep in a porkpie hat? Ever see a lemming dressed all in black? Well, you might have been there, but I'll tell you just in case: Just take a walk down St. Mark's Place."
The Sharp Things album,Foxes and Hounds, features a song called "95 Saint Mark's Place".
TheThey Might Be Giants song "On The Drag" includes the line "The allure of St. Mark's Place".
Joe Purdy's song "The City" has a verse, "When we left Brooklyn it was raining so hard. / Come up on 8th and the rain it cleared off. / We're just people watching on 3rd and St. Mark's."
The New Yorkanti-folk artistJeffrey Lewis references St. Mark's Place in the song "Scowling Crackhead Ian" as the location in which Lewis and the eponymous Ian grew up and remain.
In the double-episode season six opening episode ofMad Men, "The Doorway",Betty Francis goes to St. Mark's Place to find a girl who has run away after losing her parents, and in season 6, episode 4 ("To Have and To Hold", set in early 1968),Joan Harris and her hometown friend Kate visit theElectric Circus nightclub, located at 19–25 St. Marks Place, during a night out on the town.[57][58]
In the opening credits toSaturday Night Live (c. 2010), a shot of Cherries adult entertainment store's neon signage is featured.
In the season 3Sex and the City episode "Hot Child In The City",Sarah Jessica Parker's character Carrie goes to get her shoe fixed on St. Mark's Place and ends up dating a man who works at a comic book store on the block. Part of the episode is filmed at the actualSt. Mark's Comics.[59]
In the season 9 episode ofFriends titled "The One with the Mugging", it is revealed thatRoss was mugged outside St. Mark's Comics as a child.
The second-season finale of theComedy Central seriesBroad City is set around the main characters on a night out along St. Mark's Place, and the episode is titled "St. Mark's".
In the filmsGhostbusters II (1989) andGhostbusters: Afterlife (2021), Ray's Occult Books, a bookstore run byRay Stantz, is said to be located at 201 St. Mark's Place. The exterior of one of the two storefronts at 33 St. Mark's Place, was used to portray the store inGhostbusters II.[60]
^Morris, Gouverneur;DeWitt, Simeon;Rutherfurd, John (March 22, 1811)."Remarks of the Commissioners". Letter to.Eighth, Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Streets extend westwardly to Greenwich Lane... The Market Place already mentioned is bounded northwardly by Tenth Street, southwardly by Seventh Street, eastwardly by the East River, and westwardly by the First Avenue.
^Stokes, I.N. Phelps (1918).The Iconography of Manhattan Island 1498–1909. Vol. 3. New York: Robert H. Dodd. p. 959.OCLC831811649.Market Place ... reduced in size 1815; ceases to be a market place 1824; no longer reserved for public uses, except streets and avenues to be cut through same.
^Stokes, I.N. Phelps (1926).The Iconography of Manhattan Island 1498–1909. Vol. 5. New York: Robert H. Dodd. p. 1676.OCLC831811649.[March 18, 1828:] The legislature provides for the extension of Mercer, Greene, Wooster, McDougal, and Lewis Sts. northward to 8th St.
^Stokes 1926, pp. 1646: "[Feb. 14, 1825:] The common council passes a resolution ... to close that part of Art St. and Greenwich Lane lying between Broadway and Sixth Ave."
^What to See in New York. John Wanamaker, New York. 1912. pp. 22, 31. RetrievedApril 27, 2013.The Wanamaker business occupies two buildings—the fine old structure erected by A. T. Stewart, with its eight floors, and the new Wanamaker Building, occupying the entire block south of the Stewart Building, with sixteen floors. Combined area of the two buildings, about 32 acres. Two large tunnels under and a double-deck bridge over Ninth Street connect the two buildings.
^Durniak, Drew (December 7, 2011)."East 9th Street Then and now". The Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation. RetrievedApril 27, 2013.By 1955, Wanamaker's sold its northern store property between East 9th and 10th Streets. Before the planned demolition of the building, a fire broke out in 1956 and gutted the structure. In its place was built a huge white-brick-clad residential building called Stewart House in 1960.
