The southwest corner of Broadway and West 47th Street at Duffy Square was a very important spot for Forgotten NY in its very early days in March 1999 when the…

Ancient painted words on Freeman Street near West say “Pierce Steam” something. I’d say it was likely Pierce Steam Heating, founded by John B. Pierce and Joseph Bond in 1881.…

Proving that the art of the painted wall ad isn’t dead is this recently inscribed ad on 86th Street and Stillwell Avenue. Unless it’s repainted, succeeding generations will be poring…

I was going to hold off on this till I wrote a High Bridge page (I walked across the newly reopened span) but here’s one I’ve overlooked till now, a…

The painted word “Coogan” seen facing south on the east side of the Bowery near Grand is the exact same one that can be seen in photos of the Bowery…

Until about 2000, the Manhattan entrance to the Manhattan Bridge was a graveyard, or depository, for several outmoded types of lampposts… bishop crooks, Type F posts, and post-1950 curved mast…

“J.S. Blank & Co., Men’s Neckwear” is the only one of a handful of painted business signs still visible on East 30th Street east of 5th Avenue. The sign is…

Here’s a rare case of a so-called “faded ad” that’s not faded at all — in fact, it looks as fresh as it did when it was painted over a…

I had just finished a walk across the Manhattan Bridge after a shift in DUMBO and was heading west to the A train on Varick when I spotted this very…

This painted ad on Anchorage Place and Water Street, right next to the Manhattan Bridge, was shot from a pedestrian underpass that was closed for decades until rapid development in…

photo: Marc Landman Here’s an ancient painted ad that’s been exposed for a few months on the north side of West 47th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues for the…

Here’s a faded ad on Brighton Beach Avenue just east of Coney Island Avenue in Cyrillic characters in what I’ll presume is Russian. Translation, anybody? 12/30/14