Welcome to Building Blocks *Beta
Pick a block or take a tour and explore the East Village

The first Yiddish theater production in America was staged at Turn Hall on E. 4^th Street in 1882, though it was already popular in Europe. With the exodus of Jews to America in the late 19th- and early 20th- c., Yiddish theater flourished on the Bowery amongst saloons, vaudeville acts and music halls. After World War I, Yiddish theaters moved from the growing blight of the Bowery to 2nd Avenue. This tour explores ten sites on what was called the “Jewish Rialto” until the 1940s.
– Joyce Mendelsohn

St. Mark’s refers to St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, the oldest site of continuous worship in New York City and the city’s second-oldest public building. 8th Street, from Astor Place to Avenue A (to the western edge of Tompkins Square Park) is also known as St. Marks Place. While the street name, according to Henry Moscow’s The Street Book, is taken from the name of the church, street signs leave out the apostrophe. St. Mark’s is also the name of a historic district encompassing St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery.

These places from our grassroots “Census of Places that Matter” help us interpret the diverse cultures, architectures and histories found on East Village streets, where tradition meets contemporary life. From the City’s oldest, public, non-sectarian cemetery, to “halls for hire” hosting immigrant traditions and working class gatherings, to spaces that foster artistic activity and civic engagement, the East Village’s built environment articulates layers of New York history, memory and story. – Place Matters

No. 327 Bowery was constructed in 1835 as a Federal-style house, though it is unrecognizable as such today. When originally built, the house had a peaked roof, typical of Federal-style homes. The house was raised to meet the highest point of the peak in 1889, thereby flattening the roof. – GVSHP

This tour takes you to a dozen of the twenty-six buildings in the East 10th Street Historic District, which runs from Avenue A to Avenue B, on the north side of Tompkins Square Park. The buildings here were primarily built in the mid to late 1800s, and include an early public library, a would-be birth-control clinic, a school for girls, and the homes of merchants, immigrants, boot makers and paint salesmen. – GVSHP

Photography : Christopher D. Brazee, 2012