Outside 190 Bowery, in Soho

Photo by myself on the corner of Bowery and Spring Street.

Four guys sat on the steps of 190 Bowery, a distinctive building known to most New Yorkers, just north of the Manhattan Bridge.

The stone building is ornate and old. Its windows are dirty and its base is covered with paste-ups and graffiti. It looks deserted.

Invariably, someone will be sitting or lying on the front steps. Mark and I have driven by often, and I've longed to take a photograph because the scene would look so transient. This weekend, I walked by and these four fellows allowed me to take their photo. I was ecstatic.

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I first heard about 190 Bowery from Mark, during one of our drives past the building.

'Oh that's where the famous photographer lives. I forget his name.'

The photographer Jay Maisel and his family live inside the six-story building, which looks completely derelict outside. He bought the former bank building in 1966 for just over $100k. Yes, that's $100k.


The base of 190 Bowery is literally covered with graffiti tags and paste-ups.

Of course, times have changed and we're talking about 40 years ago, when Soho was nothing like the posh neighborhood it is now. You'd be hard pressed to find a studio apartment selling for $300k today, never mind a six-story building.

New York Magazine published a great article about the building a couple years ago, which includes a slide show of the interiors. Click here to see it.

The Dragon Parade on Mott Street, The Taiwanese Festival in Union Square and A Careful Choice, in Chinatown.