Table of Contents
Introduction
Fifth Avenue is the most well-known and likely the most legendary street in New York and maybe even the world. Beginning at the southeastern tip of Manhattan’s Greenwich Village neighborhood known as Washington Square Park and ending in Harlem, Fifth Avenue bisects a number of premier sites and stores in the Big Apple.
For the tourists, the walk up Fifth Avenue will reveal the old New York as well as the new one. So why not stroll leisurely up this iconic street simply to marvel at some of the historical buildings, watch the passers-by, go shopping, and stop to visit some of the City’s most renowned museums and attractions which are also situated here along the way?
Downtown Fifth Avenue
Some historically significant buildings, luxury stores, and several hotels are located in the bottom part of Fifth Avenue beginning at Washington Square Park up to 34st. This southern part of Fifth Avenue contains the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, the Rockefeller Center, and most of New York City’s shopping district.
Washington Square Park, right up to the Flatiron Building
Begin your walking tour at Washington Square Park, NYU’s main leisure ground; here, students practice, the musicians jam and there are usually a lot of people around. First of all: take some photos of the attractive Washington Square Arch and then continue north along Fifth Avenue.
Take a walk through the low-rise area with fancy apartments and shops, cafés, and of course, observers. Alive since at least 1902, the Flatiron Building at 23rd Street is a steel-framed twenty-storey skyscraper designed by Daniel Burnham.
Check out this triangular New York City gem and the locality before moving further north into the shopping area of the city.
From Madison Square Park to the Empire State Building
Between 26th and 30th Sts you will find Madison Square Park where architectural landmarks of the 1900s are represented by MetLife Building, New York Life Building, and, of course, Flatiron Building across the street.
Enjoy Madison Square Park and then pass by the famous shopping scene in Fifth Avenue which encompasses Tiffany’s, Saks Fifth Avenue, Bergdorf Goodman, Cartier, Valentino, Versace, or Armani one right after the other. You can walk into some of these classy departmental stores, luxury brand shops & jewelry for some shopping or just sightseeing if your pocket permits!
Going further north we have 30 Rockefeller Plaza between 48-51 Street, the center of Rock well known Rockefeller Center including General Electric the Building with the top light stream, NBC studio where Saturday Night Live and Today Show are filmed, and there are gardens including channel gardens, Prometheus statue in gold color and the famous Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. Quantitatively, it’s an entertainment, business, tourist, food, and advertising destination all under one region.
To the north of Rockefeller Center is the Empire State Building at 34th Street. This Art Deco skyscraper is still among the most recognized top attractions in New York City; it was the tallest building in NYC when it opened in 1931. You can only gaze at it from the outside or take an elevator trip to the Observatory Decks to behold one hundred-eight miles of horizontal cityscapes in clear weather conditions.
From St. Patrick’s Cathedral to the Metropolitan Museum of Art
To the north, 50th Street is home to the elaborate Gothic-Revival St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the largest Catholic church in the US built in 1879. Just a few blocks north on 52’nd Street is the famous 21 Club New York. Although it is now a dignified private members-only establishment founded and managed by Kiley, what it once was was a place where people could just walk in as long as they could afford a required jacket. To the north of 21, with jockeys perched atop pedestals is the Paley Center for Media where television and media programs’ collections can be seen.
On 82nd-86th Streets there is Museum Mile – one of the most concentrated museum areas in the world. Over here is the huge neoclassical Metropolitan Museum of Art often referred to simply as The Met, which is one of the largest art museums in New York City containing more than two million works of art. It attracts tourists from around the globe to appreciate one of the biggest collections of art that The Met offers exhibiting works from 5 000 years ago.
Beyond the impressive exterior including the grand stairs, one finds vast halls and galleries of temples of ancient Egypt renaissance sculptures, European paintings, mind-blowing modern art, and much more. If you are fond of visiting entry tickets, visit us as they are “Pay as You Wish,” and you will decide how much to offer to be allowed into the site. Just note the museum is so big that one may need more than one visit to cover the entire area.
Check Out: Hocking Hills State Park: Ohio’s Scenic Escape of Waterfalls, Caves, and Trails.
Central Park to Harlem
The northern tip of Fifth Avenue lies towards the east of the splendid 843-acre Central Park which spans between 59th and 110th streets. Olvera considered Central Park in 1858 by legendary landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux as one of the most renowned parks on the globe.
Spend some time wandering and watching the numerous trails, streams, meadows, lakes, areaways, streams, bridges, buildings, and sights and play areas throughout Central Park. Some of them are Bethesda Fountain and Terrace, Strawberry Fields John Lennon Memorial, Central Park Zoo, Central Park Conservancy Gardens, The Mall which is a footpath line with elm trees, and so on as well as some of the famous places seen in movies.
After crossing Central Park to 96th Street there is the historic neighborhood of Harlem that has long been associated with black Americans who starting in the early 20th century developed the area famously known as the “Harlem Renaissance”.
Conclusion
A walk up Fifth Avenue gives New York City visitors an amazingly fun preview of some of the best, must-see attractions in New York City. From magnificent parks featuring classic architecture, shopping districts, and museums, to the legendary Central Park and historic Harlem, the avenue offers a great view of many typical New York City landmarks and districts that represent certain aspects of the city’s image. Please use this guide as a reference for planning your own Fifth Avenue sightseeing tour.
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FAQs
How long will it take me to walk along the Statue of Liberty and how long will it take me to walk the length of Fifth Avenue?
Of course, if you were to do the full miles of Fifth Avenue from Lower Manhattan, Greenwich Village’s Washington Square Park up through Central Park and Harlem, it would take 4-5 hours to complete if one were to stroll briskly without taking a break to browse through stores, grabbing a meal or stop to see some of the attractions. Realistically, if stopping in the places of interest and visiting energetic sights and attractions of Fifth Avenue, the time needed will most likely be considerably more and probably can span across more days.
How can one glimpse at the best highlights of Fifth Avenue in case of limited time?
If you do not have much time, the bus-guided bus tours of New York including the famous Big Bus Tours and Gray Line New York Sightseeing around Fifth Avenue, and if lucky, you would be sure to get a sight of quite famous buildings such as the Flatiron Building, Empire State Building and, Rockefeller Center just to mention but a few along the Fifth Avenue. These practical double deer bus tours let you with a live tour guide on architecture and history of the sights in the route. Another option is taking the New York City subway which effectively moves one between the stops of attractions.
What three Museums/attractions must be viewed on Fifth Avenue?
Among these, the three most notable museums sit directly on Fifth Avenue and are a must-visit – The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the ‘Met’, the Guggenheim m Museum for modern and contemporary collection of art, and the Neue Galerie for fine early twentieth-century German and Austrian art and design. Aside from museums found along Fifth Avenue, off Fifth Avenue, must-see sites that should not be missed when visiting NYC are the Rockefeller Center, the Empire State Building, Central Park, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and of course, the Museum of Modern Art or MoMA.