Loading map...
Art WalkChinatown & Little Italy
Down and Around Elizabeth Street to Canal
Some of downtown’s sharpest galleries tucked into a stretch where Little Italy and Chinatown collide and refuse to sort themselves out.
Last updated Jul 9, 2026
It's touristy, it's crowded, and it works.
People come to the neighborhood for different reasons. The Basilica of St. Patrick's Old Cathedral. The Elizabeth Street Garden. The Feast of San Gennaro. Lunar New Year. Handbags that are not what they claim to be. Or lunch.
This is one of the few places where red-sauce Italian, dim sum, hand-pulled noodles, mochi doughnuts, and bouncy, lighter-than-air cheesecakes all feel like equally good ideas.
The galleries fit right in. They’re scattered along Elizabeth and Grand, down onto Canal, and over to the lower Bowery. They’re in former garages, church buildings, lofts overlooking the San Gennaro rides, and Chinatown office buildings (some with elevators, some without).
This isn't downtown's flashiest circuit. It's definitely not its quietest. But it's one of the most fun to wander.
Art Spaces
GalleryLittle Italy
Company Gallery
Feminist, queer, theatrical art in a graffiti-covered gallery with a basement speakeasy.
GalleryLittle Italy
Nathalie Karg Gallery
This elegiac, two-storey Elizabeth Street gallery is a place of worship for refined, sensual art.
Alternative SpaceLittle Italy
PARTICIPANT INC
One of downtown's most beloved alternative art spaces. Politics, performance, community, and experimentation collide here. Black walls and raw, deeply human shows that cling to your mind long after you leave.
GalleryLittle Italy
Derosia
Self-aware, socially-motivated painting about culture, media, and the moment we’re living in.
GalleryLittle Italy
Peter Blum Gallery
Riding the waves of minimalist and conceptual art since their beginnings, with each new generation picking up the thread.
GalleryChinatown
Ulrik
Take the pulse of the new New York scene at this spacious, sunny second-floor gallery overlooking Canal Street, where artistic careers are launched and revitalized.
GalleryChinatown
Magenta Plains
Two generations of artists, decades apart, making high-concept, anti-establishment work on the topic of freedom.
GalleryChinatown
Hoffman Donahue
Playful, boundary-merging art reflecting on the rituals of everyday life, set against the backdrop of an old-school loft space on the Bowery.
Places to Pause
Coffee Shop & BakeryChinatown
Koré Coffee
Fuel up (or refuel) after you’ve explored the NoLita galleries at this white brick and wood-clad, family-run coffee shop on Elizabeth Street. Try the famous Tiramisu blend.
Coffee ShopChinatown
Derby Cup Coffee
One of those rare places that becomes part of how you live in Chinatown. Oxblood walls, striped ceilings, jockey art, and leather banquettes that hold an afternoon. Order the pistachio iced latte, cozy in, and get to know the neighborhood regulars filing in and out.
