Meatpacking District

A small but distinctive neighborhood in downtown Manhattan bordered by Chelsea and the West Village, the Meatpacking District runs roughly from 14th Street south to Gansevoort Street, and from the Hudson River east to Hudson Street. The Meatpacking District, once full of the industrial plants and butcher shops that gave this neighborhood its name, has scrubbed its warehouses and reinvented itself as a haute couture district, where industrial meets elegant. True to its name, the area once held up to 250 slaughterhouse and meat-packing businesses at its peak in the early twentieth century, supplying the entire nation with dressed meats from its red-brick warehouses and cobbled streets. By the eighties the meatpacking world was replaced by trendy clubs and a booming gay subculture, with such famous names as The Hellfire Club and The Mineshaft turning the Meatpacking District into the go-to nightlife scene, inherited by today’s trendy club-goers.

The transformation from blue-collar to glitter continues now, with designers such as Diane Von Furstenberg, Christian Louboutin, and Stella McCartney establishing fashion houses in the area, and hip restaurants and exclusive clubs attracting celebrities and gawkers alike. But there’s more to the Meatpacking District than its glitter. The buzzed-about High Line begins in the Meatpacking District’s Gansevoort Street, adding a burst of greenery and art to the area. Butcher shops and wholesale meat companies still operate, retaining the blue-collar edge that has always been the distinctive mark of the Meatpacking District. The Gansevoort Market Historic District preserves the neighborhood’s industrial history and architecture, from the metal awnings over utilitarian buildings to the intersecting cobblestoned streets. A neighborhood that contrasts blue-collar industrialism with alluring nightlife and celebrity boutiques, the Meatpacking District represents both the practical past and the dreamy future of Manhattan.