The first Bronx subway stop on the 6 train from Manhattan leaves you a block from 138th Street and Alexander Avenue. Once known as “Doctors Row” and “The Irish Fifth Avenue,” Alexander Avenue between here and 141st Street boasts gorgeous row houses dating to the 1870s.
If you swoon over original details and don’t mind living sandwiched between a couple of housing projects, this could be the block for you.
Though now considered part of the catch-all South Bronx, the neighborhood is in the tiny Mott Haven Historic District. Once a thriving community dominated by Mott Ironworks and piano factories, Mott Haven fell victim to the usual urban blight in the 1960s and 1970s.
In the 1990s, antique shops, lofts, and a couple of cafes on nearby Bruckner Boulevard have helped revive the area. It feels pretty safe, yet reports of the neighborhood’s Soho-fication are, well, premature. Luckily, remnants of old Mott Haven still remain, like this piano ad.
Check out the brick sign on the old Mott Ironworks building, on the Harlem River. J. L. Mott is Jordan Mott, an industrialist who bought the land from the Morris (as in Morrisania) family in 1828.
Tags: Alexander Avenue, Mott Haven, South Bronx
September 5, 2008 at 5:17 am |
[...] Mott Haven has more to offer, like its own historic district and some gorgeous blocks along Alexander Avenue. Check them out here. [...]
May 5, 2009 at 8:55 pm |
Unbelievably beautiful area in the South Bronx! Thanks for showing the good that still exists there.
December 18, 2009 at 2:07 am |
[...] Doctors’ Row—well, at least the brownstones, if not the doctors—still exists in the South [...]
April 11, 2010 at 11:28 pm |
it is a great area. My grandma immigrated to the states in the 1960s and has lived in the Bronx ever since. I just hope this area has not been invaded by hipsters and wannabe manhattanites like its has happened in Harlem.
September 4, 2012 at 3:42 pm |
I HAVE LIVED IN MOTT HAVEN PROJECTS AND I WENT TO ST PUIS V CATHOLIC SCHOOL MY WHOE LIFE.. NEW YORK IS THE BEST CITY IN THE WORLD AND MOTT HAVEN JUST MAKS IT GREAT.
March 25, 2013 at 4:55 am |
[...] Here’s another beautiful stretch of Bronx rowhouses, kept up well with Romanesque detailing and stained glass windows. [...]
April 5, 2013 at 12:19 am |
I was born at Bronx Hospital lived at 581 East 137th Street, near Willis and Cypress Avenues for the first 7 years of my life.
April 18, 2013 at 1:31 am |
During a recent visit from my home in CA to The Bronx where i was born and lived until 1978, I was just on Alexander Ave at a 5-Star sushi restaurant called CeeTay. Food is great as mentioned by many reviews and by friends in NYC. “Go South Bronx!” May it continue to grow stronger.