The ground floor of the dingy walkup at 203 West 14th Street, off of Seventh Avenue, houses a neighborhood donut joint. A nail salon is on the second floor.
The remaining storefronts on the northwest corner of the block are pretty ugly—they help give West 14th its grimy, discount-store vibe.
But this colorful window on the second-floor fire escape at 203 must have been beautiful at one time. It’s one of those hidden gems New York is famous for; you could walk by it a million times and not realize it was there.
And then one day, you finally see it. Too bad the glass panels are falling in and the window is so dirty, it’s hard to tell what it depicts.
The stenciled address above it is a nice touch. Whoever lived here then seemed to take some pride in the building.
Ephemeral New York 