Greenwich Village

Greenwich Village is where the grid gives up. The streets bend and cross at angles, Fourth Street manages to intersect Tenth, and the fastest way to see it is to stop trying to navigate and just walk.

Washington Square Park is the center of everything. The arch, the fountain, the chess tables in the southwest corner, a piano someone has pushed in, and NYU spread around the edges. Sit on the fountain rim for twenty minutes and the whole city goes past.

The music is the real reason to be here at night. The Village Vanguard has been recording live albums in its basement wedge since the 1950s, and the rule is that nobody talks during the set. The Blue Note books bigger names, Smalls runs a jam that goes past 3am, and Le Poisson Rouge on Bleecker books a string quartet and a techno night in the same week. The Comedy Cellar has been putting famous people on a tiny MacDougal Street stage since 1982.

In daylight it slows down. Caffe Reggio on MacDougal has been pulling espresso since 1927 and still has the original machine. Dante on the same street has been there since 1915 and is now one of the best aperitivo bars in the world, which makes a 3pm negroni entirely defensible.