BookstoreEast Village
Mast Books
A serene, curated neighborhood bookstore on Avenue A where art, photography, poetry, and unexpected discoveries share the same shelf.
Photo by Anastasia Simone for Beholdr
Walk in With Us
Some people think downtown taste ended with Jonas Mekas and Luc Sante. Mast sits on a sun-flooded stretch of Avenue A, and is proof that good taste can still surprise you. It carries that lineage, but it keeps reaching forward, stocking whatever's cool right now alongside the canon. A forgotten monograph, say. Or a strange 1970s paperback. Maybe a small-press title you can't leave behind. We once walked out with miniature Philip K. Dick paperbacks whose covers could've been designed by John Giorno. The kind of finds that just seem to find you.
About the Bookstore
Bryan Leitgeb, a used-books veteran who'd spent seven years at Mercer Books, opened Mast in 2010 on Avenue A with co-founder James McKee.
This tightly curated shop of rare and out-of-print titles hinges on Leitgeb's distinctly downtown taste ("everything is filtered through me," he once said) and doubles as a gallery, with a history of readings and shows alongside figures like Jonas Mekas and Luc Sante.
Featured In
Routes and collections this place belongs to
In The Area
MuseumEast Village
The Brant Foundation
Downtown legends, ambitious shows, and giant industrial architecture combine in one of the East Village's most unexpectedly great art spaces. Warhol, Haring, Basquiat, Kelley — the Brant Foundation feels like walking through the last forty years of contemporary art history.
GalleryEast Village
Half Gallery
This glass-walled gallery shows realist work in which desire and fantasy simmer on the surface.
Coffee ShopEast Village
Café Chrystie
Coffee, clothing, and photography books squeezed into one narrow storefront, from a photographer and designer embedded in the skate world.
RestaurantEast Village
Cafe Mogador
East Village cool kids have come here for decades, and it still delivers — Moroccan eggs at brunch, lamb tagine late at night, all in a room of hot pinks and tall plants.