The arch at Washington Square in the heart of the Village is one of New York’s iconic scenes. Visit on a warm spring day and you’ll find busking street performers and political activists gathering under it. Greenwich Village’s bohemian roots still influence the neighborhood as one of city’s simultaneously most stimulating and relaxed neighborhoods.

Greenwich Village began as farmland and evolved to the home of the city’s wealthy class in the early 19th century. A potter’s field called Washington Square was developed into a leafy green park, while developers created handsome row-houses along its edges which remain some of the finest in the city. New York University would eventually grow from erecting its first building here, to dominating the area.

In the 20th century, Greenwich Village became the home of intellectuals, writers, radicals, and artists. The area retains that identity, and the coffeehouses, bookstores, Art-house cinemas, jazz clubs, and Off-Broadway theatre are comforting to lovers of NYC counter-culture. It became famous as the center of Beat culture in the 1950s and 1960s; and evolved into a bohemian enclave with the likes of writers Kerouac and Ginsberg and musicians like Bob Dylan on the scene, along with the rest of the city’s creative cognoscenti.

Today, a mix of residents are drawn by its lively energy and commercial activity around Union Square and on Broadway and Sixth Avenue. It contains several Landmarked Historic Districts .NYU is housed in a several buildings near Washington Square, along with the New School, and Parsons School of Design.