Mercer Street
Mercer Street, Soho
Soho, like many other `hoods, is going through a drastic period of gentrification. I used to work in a gallery across the street from this very spot (55 Mercer Street Galler -- supposedly the "second oldest" art co-op in the city) back in `89/`90, and Mercer Street was a dark, gritty little strip seeped in character (with splashes of random art scrawled all over the walls as in the image above). In the last couple of years, however, this little strip has had more nips and tucks than Pamela Anderson. Portions of the strip are still endearingly seedy, but that flavour is fading fast.