8 Best Sights in New York City, New York

Manhattan's Little Italy is overrun with mediocre restaurants aimed at tourists, but Belmont (meaning "beautiful hill"), the Little Italy of the Bronx, is a real, thriving Italian American community. Unless you have family in the area, the main reason to come here is for the food: eating it, buying it, looking at it fondly through windows, and chatting with shopkeepers about it—perhaps getting recipe advice.

Nearly a century after pushcarts on Arthur Avenue catered to Italian American workers constructing the zoo and botanical garden, the area teems with meat markets, bakeries, cheese makers, and shops selling kitchenware (espresso machines, pasta makers, etc.). There are debates about which store or restaurant is the "best," but thanks to generations of Italian grandmothers, most vendors here serve fresh, handmade foods—including the sausages of the famed "sausage chandelier" at the Calabria Pork Store (  2338 Arthur Ave.). Although the area is no longer solely Italian—many Latinos and Albanians share this neighborhood now—Italian Americans dominate the food scene. 

Despite sitting in the shade of the Empire State Building and being just steps from Herald Square, Koreatown (or "K-Town," as it's locally known) is not a tourist destination. In fact, it's a bustling area, with traditional and trendy places to shop, eat, drink, and be merry right under the noses of millions of tourists. Technically, Koreatown runs from 31st to 36th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues, though the main drag is 32nd Street between 5th and Broadway. Labeled Korea Way, this strip is home to Korean barbecue joints, karaoke bars, and grocery and beauty stores, all stacked next to each other. Find just about everything K-Pop-related at Koryo Books ( 35 W. 32nd St.), scope out a popular food hall at Food Gallery 32 ( 11 W. 32nd St.), or order desserts most worthy of an Instagram reel at Grace Street Coffee & Desserts ( 17 W 32nd St.). Fill up on kimchi (spicy pickled cabbage), kimbap (seaweed rice rolls), and red bean doughnuts (delicious); then top off your Koreatown experience by stepping into a jade-igloo sauna at Juvenex Spa ( 25 W. 32nd St.).

An affectionate play on the name of the nearby Murray Hill neighborhood to the north, Curry Hill is a roughly three-block area with a large concentration of Indian restaurants. There are dozens of eateries peppered (or is it spiced?) around Lexington Avenue between 26th and 28th Streets, with many regional cuisines represented, including a number of South Indian dosa spots. Check out Kalustyan's ( 123 Lexington Ave.), the long-standing Indian spice-and-grocery market, too.

To envision this neighborhood's Harlem Renaissance days, walk down tree-lined Convent Avenue and cross over to Hamilton Terrace to see a time capsule of elegant stone row houses in mint condition. One of the neighborhood's most beautiful blocks, it's popular with film and TV crews. The Hamilton Grange National Memorial, founding father Alexander Hamilton's Federal-style mansion, is located at the southern end of the block, on 141st Street. Turn west and continue down Convent Avenue to see the looming Gothic spires (1905) of City College. Next, head east to visit Strivers' Row.

There's no doubt you can find Japanese restaurants and shops all over Manhattan, but the area roughly bounded by East 10th and St. Marks Place (aka East 8th Street), between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, is home to what might be the highest concentration of Japan-style goods and dining spots. You can shop for Japanese groceries, snacks, and prepared food at specialty store H Mart ( 39 3rd Ave.); stop in at tiny storefronts like Cha-An BONBON ( 238A E. 9th St.) for fancy Japanese desserts and teas; and dine at a variety of Japanese curry, ramen, soba, and sushi spots. There's even karaoke at Sing Sing ( 9 St. Marks Pl.).

This block of gorgeous 1890s Georgian and Italian Renaissance Revival homes earned its nickname in the 1920s from less-affluent Harlemites who felt its residents were "striving" to become well-to-do. Some of the few remaining private service alleys, used when deliveries arrived via horse and cart, lie behind these houses and are visible through iron gates. Note the gatepost between Nos. 251 and 253 on 138th Street that reads, "Private Road. Walk Your Horses." These houses were built by the contractor David H. King Jr., whose developments also include Madison Square Garden and the Washington Arch. When the houses failed to sell to white people, the properties on these blocks were sold to Black doctors, lawyers, and other professionals; composers and musicians W. C. Handy and Eubie Blake were also among the residents. If you have the time, detour a block north to see the palazzo-style group of houses designed by Stanford White, on the north side of 139th Street.

Standing on the bluff of Sugar Hill overlooking Jackie Robinson Park, outside the slightly run-down 409 Edgecombe Avenue, you'd never guess that here resided such influential African Americans as NAACP founder W. E. B. DuBois and Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. In 1946, Langston Hughes reportedly called it one of Harlem’s “most fashionable addresses." And farther north at 555 Edgecombe (known as the "Triple Nickel"), literary icon Zora Neale Hurston and jazz musicians Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Lena Horne, and others lived, wrote, and played. It's also here that, for more than 25 years, musician Marjorie Eliot has been hosting jazz concerts in her apartment (3F) at 3:30 pm every Sunday. Farther down, at No. 345, you can't miss the Benzinger House with its flared mansard roof. Amid all this history, the modern-looking Sugar Hill Children's Museum of Art & Storytelling, at 155th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue, gathers local families for programs that encourage the creative spirit of children.

In 1925, prominent real-estate developer Fred F. French was among the first Americans ever to buy up a large number of buildings—most of them tenements—and join the properties into a single, massive new complex. He designed a collection of nine apartment buildings and two parks in the "garden city" mode, which placed a building's green space not in an enclosed courtyard, but in the foreground. French also built a 39-by-50-foot "Tudor City" sign atop one of the 22-story buildings, best viewed from the eastern end of 42nd Street. The development's residential towers opened between 1927 and 1930, borrowing a marketable air of sophistication from Tudor-style stonework, stained-glass windows, and lobby-design flourishes. Tudor City has been featured in numerous films, and its landmark gardens—sometimes compared to Gramercy Park, only public—remain a popular lunch spot among office workers. The neighborhood, which is near the United Nations, was designated a historic district in 1988.