New York Nabes

Wall Street & the Battery

Nearly at the southern tip of Manhattan and clustered around the New York and American stock exchanges, Wall Street is both the name of the downtown financial nexus and a thoroughfare. The grand and hulking architecture wedged into these blocks truly does merit comparison to canyons. The Dutch began the colony of Nieuw Amsterdam on these narrow streets, and a century and a half later, George Washington was sworn in on Wall Street as the United States first president. Luckily, the destruction that leveled the nearby World Trade Center did not physically damage the area. The absolute tip of the island is leafy Battery Park, full of war monuments and benches on which to rest and catch a harbor breeze.

The Seaport & the Courts

New York's days as a great 19th-century haven for clipper ships are preserved in lower Manhattan at South Street Seaport, centered on Fulton Street at the East River and crowned by the Brooklyn Bridge. On the cobblestone pedestrian streets and wooden docks, street performers compete with tall masted ships and retail stores for audiences' attention. Just blocks west of the seaport, you can take in the majestic court buildings of the City Hall area.

Little Italy & Chinatown

No longer the large community it once was, Little Italy is now basically confined to Mulberry Street between Canal and Broome streets. A few remaining Italian-American families and touristy eateries keep traditions alive, such as September's San Gennaro festival and summer sidewalk dining. Chinatown has grown north of its original boundary of Canal Street, spilling into much of what was once Little Italy, and also farther east into the Lower East Side, a formerly Jewish neighborhood. As you head east from Broadway along Canal Street, Chinese discount stalls and jewelry stores increase in number, and to the south, a carnival-like atmosphere reigns on the small streets, which are packed with purveyors of untold varieties of pungent fish, unusual vegetables, and pastries.

SoHo & TriBeCa

A neighborhood of cast-iron buildings and a few Belgian brick streets, SoHo (South of Houston Street) is bounded on its other three sides by Lafayette Street, Canal Street, and 6th Avenue. Artists transformed SoHo's late 19th-century factories into loft studios in the 1960s, and many of the galleries that followed have since been replaced by cushy restaurants and high-fashion boutiques. To the south and west, TriBeCa (the Triangle Below Canal Street) extends roughly as far as Murray Street and east to West Broadway. The broader streets of TriBeCa have a neighborhood feel, with a sprinkling of pricey restaurants and precious specialty shops, and many converted factory buildings.

Greenwich Village

The pattern of narrow, tree-lined streets known to New Yorkers simply as "the Village" remains true to its 19th-century heritage as a haven for bohemians, students, artists, actors, carousers, and tourists. Extending from 14th Street south to Houston Street and from the piers of the Hudson River east to 5th Avenue, it's one of the best parts of the city to wander for hours. Jazz clubs and piano bars line Grove Street, where literary legends have left their mark at old speakeasies and taverns. The Village is still stomping grounds of one of the largest gay communities in the country (specifically on Sheridan Square and Christopher Street).

The East Village & the Lower East Side

Once an edgy neighborhood of immigrants, artists, and punks, the East Village was hit with a wave of gentrification in the 1990s that is now lapping Avenue C, the penultimate avenue of sub-neighborhood Alphabet City. NYU students and young executives have joined the harmonious mélange that frequents the Polish and Ukrainian coffee shops, black-box theaters, trendy pasta bars, and St. Mark's Place -- a raggedy stretch of vintage stores, fetish shops, and sidewalk vendors. The area is bounded by 14th Street on the north, 4th Avenue or the Bowery on the west, Houston Street on the south, and the park-lined East River.

Saunter south of Houston Street and you'll enter the Lower East Side, once the cramped stepping-stone of many of New York's immigrant groups, and where the legacy of Jewish immigrants remains strongest in discount clothing, fabric, and design stores, and even a century-old knish bakery on Houston Street. Young clothing designers and hip bars and restaurants are now filling the storefronts of residential buildings on streets such as Eldridge and Ludlow.

Murray Hill, Flatiron District & Gramercy

In the nascent years of the skyscraper, two of New York's most distinctive structures wowed New Yorkers within the Flatiron District: the 21-story Fuller Building (now known as the Flatiron Building), wedged into the tight triangle created by 5th Avenue, Broadway, and 23rd Street; and the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company's 693-foot tower soaring above Madison Square Park. Within walking distance of this commercial area are the brownstone mansions and town houses of Gramercy, in the East 20s, and of Murray Hill, in the East 30s. Moneyed families such as the Roosevelts and Morgans made their homes here in the mid-19th century. The southern gateway to these neighborhoods is Union Square.

Chelsea

Like its London district namesake, New York's Chelsea maintains a villagelike personality, with quiet streets graced by renovated town houses. The neighborhood stretches from 6th Avenue west to the Hudson River, and from 14th Street to the upper 20s. Chelsea has always been congenial to writers and artists, and it has also embraced a multicultural population for decades; the neighborhood has largely supplanted the Village as the center of gay (mostly male) life in the city. The contemporary art scene thrives in spacious warehouse galleries west of 10th Avenue from West 20th to West 29th streets.

42nd Street

From west to east, this famous street is like a symphony of movements. It starts off slightly slow and seedy before a rapid crescendo to the tacky razzle-dazzle at Times Square, glaringly bright every day of the year. Thirty or so major Broadway theaters are nearby, in an area bounded roughly by West 41st and 53rd streets between 6th and 9th avenues. Before and after the show, critics, actors, directors, playwrights, and spectators come to dine on Restaurant Row (46th Street between 8th and 9th avenues) and along 9th Avenue in Hell's Kitchen. Midway across the island, the street's pulse gradually calms to the tree-lined stretch of Bryant Park and the New York Public Library. The pace picks up east of 5th Avenue, with high-rise offices, Grand Central Terminal, and the Chrysler Building. Finally, the strident energy subsides near the genteel residences of Tudor City, the stately United Nations headquarters, and the balcony over the East River.

Rockefeller Center & Midtown Skyscrapers

The 19-building complex known as Rockefeller Center inhabits 22 acres of prime real estate between 5th and 7th avenues and 47th and 52nd streets. The center is full of keepsake photo shots such as the ice-skating rink and towering Christmas tree fronting the GE building, the fan-staging area outside NBC's Today Show, and the pink-and-blue neon marquis of Radio City Music Hall. St. Patrick's Cathedral, Saks Fifth Avenue, and the rest of midtown's gleaming skyscrapers are just walk signs away.

5th Avenue & 57th Street

One of the world's great shopping districts, 5th Avenue north of Rockefeller Center, and 57th Street between Lexington Avenue and 7th Avenue are where some of the crème de la crème of designer boutiques and the biggest names in New York retailing. Follow Holly Golightly's lead in Breakfast at Tiffany's and come to look even if you know you won't buy. Music aficionados of different bandwidths make their way to West 57th Street for either Carnegie Hall or the Hard Rock Cafe.

The Upper East Side

Between Park and 5th avenues is where Old Money resides, and the tony restaurants and social clubs serve as extensions of luxurious town houses. Historic district designation has ensured that much of the Upper East Side between East 59th and 78th streets hasn't strayed from its turn-of-the-20th-century good taste, but whatever pushes the envelope of acceptability is sure to be on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Steel yourself for the clash of desire and resources when viewing the wares of Madison Avenue's haute couture boutiques.

Museum Mile

Once called Millionaire's Row, the stretch of 5th Avenue along Central Park between East 79th and 104th streets is still home to more millionaires -- and billionaires -- than any other street in the city. It earned its nickname Museum Mile for the world-class collections of art and artifacts scattered along its length. The only building built by Frank Lloyd Wright in New York is the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Don't leave without visiting at least a few galleries in the largest art museum in the western hemisphere, the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Central Park

This 843-acre patch of rolling countryside is where Manhattanites escape from the urban jungle and reconnect with nature. Nowhere does a rippled pond, peeping duckling, or crimson leaf seem more precious and remarkable than against a backdrop of high-rises. Central Park serves the city's most soothing vistas and opportunities for just about any outdoor activity. White clothing is required for the croquet course, and at the open-air disco just off the northeast corner of the Sheep Meadow, rollerbladers move with figure-skaters' liquid grace. Buskers, massage practitioners, and remote-controlled miniature sailboats are some of the other pleasant distractions. The rectangular park is bordered by 59th and 110th streets, and 5th Avenue and Central Park West.

The Upper West Side

Ornate prewar buildings line the residential boulevards of Riverside Drive, West End Avenue, and Central Park West and the commercial thoroughfare of Broadway, providing a stately backdrop for the lines of patrons awaiting a table during weekend brunch hours. Weaving between baby strollers, aspiring actors, and Juilliard students hustling off to their auditions and rehearsals, walk up busy Columbus Avenue at least as far as the American Museum of Natural History. At night, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts is what draws many to the area.

Morningside Heights

Rising up between the Upper West Side and Harlem, Morningside Heights is home to the ivied buildings of Columbia University, one of the nation's oldest, and to the magnificent French Gothic Cathedral of St. John the Divine, which in addition to religious services sponsors music performances of all genres. Two of the most visited buildings alongside Riverside Park are here: Grant's Tomb and Riverside Church.

Harlem

An important influence on American culture, Harlem has been a hotbed of African-American and Hispanic-American culture and life for nearly a century. Music is a part of the cultural draw, be it gospel services at Baptist churches or amateur nights at the Apollo Theatre. The collection of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture includes early jazz and blues recordings. Harlem extends north from 110th Street to about 145th Street (the border of Manhattanville); the most interesting sights on the West Side roughly between 116th and 135th streets.