The Cathedral of St. John the Divine on Amsterdam Avenue is the largest church in North America and the sixth largest in the world. It is 183 meters long, the central nave is 38 meters high, and its floor area is over 11,000 square meters. It has stood in Morningside Heights since 1892, yet it…
The Oculus in New York City is a transportation hub on the site of the World Trade Center, which took 12 years to build and cost four billion dollars instead of the planned two. It now serves as the world’s most expensive train station, a trade center, and a memorial. Every September 11th, from 8:46…
New York City boasts one of the city’s most brutalist facades, seemingly leading to a bunker, the Masons’ main vault, or an army depot. But in reality, it’s a church, and it’s called The Salvation Army. It turns out that The Salvation Army is a Christian movement, both a church and a charitable organization. From…
Madison Avenue is one of Manhattan’s five major avenues, running north to south parallel to Fifth Avenue and Park Avenue. The street begins at Madison Square (23rd Street) and ends at the Madison Avenue Bridge at 138th Street, crossing the entire island. Its total length is approximately 8 kilometers. This name is known worldwide in…
View of Central Park from the RCA Building Observation Deck, 1964, the former name of the first version of the modern Top of the Rock observation deck. Interestingly, the name “Top of the Rock” is relatively new, having only appeared in the fall of 2005, when the deck was reopened as a separate tourist attraction…
Imagine walking down Fifth Avenue past the windows of Saks Fifth Avenue, Gucci, and the Apple Store, and suddenly seeing a snow-white Gothic church. St. Patrick’s Cathedral, against the backdrop of Rockefeller Center and glass skyscrapers, looks as if it was teleported here from medieval Europe. It is the main Catholic church in New York…
Every September, leaders of nearly two hundred countries gather in New York. Most of the speeches they deliver at the UN are forgotten the next day. But some remain forever. The General Assembly Hall has heard many things: threats and tears, revolutionary manifestos and quiet words of hope. Here are ten speeches from this podium…
Interestingly, the permanent UN exhibition in New York has a separate section dedicated to the anti-nuclear movement of the then Kazakh SSR in 1989, which ultimately led to the closure of the Semipalatinsk Test Site. The movement, incidentally, is called “Nevada-Semipalatinsk.” This is no coincidence: the advent of glasnost in the late 1980s made it…
There are buildings that become symbols of a city not because they are the tallest or the most expensive, but because they look completely unlike anything around them. The Flatiron Building is exactly that. Sharp like the bow of a ship, cutting into the intersection of Broadway and Fifth Avenue, it has remained one of…
It’s impossible not to guess the city… This photo was taken on July 9, 1988,incidentally, not from New York, but from the neighboring state of New Jersey. Photo by Jeffrey Johnson
