Bronx
The Grand Concourse
Art Deco apartment houses, Ghanaian kitchens, and the Bronx's grand boulevard.
The Grand Concourse was designed in the 1890s on the model of the Champs-Élysées and opened in 1909, a four-mile boulevard laid along the ridge of the West Bronx. In the 1920s and 1930s it filled with Art Deco and Art Moderne apartment houses — curved corners, zigzag brickwork, sunburst lobbies, and casement windows wrapping the turns — the finest such collection in the city, and much of it is now a historic district.
The people who live in those buildings have changed with every generation, from the Jewish families of the boulevard's first decades to the Puerto Rican, Dominican, Mexican, Honduran, and West African communities of today. The Concourse, and the avenues off it, are where to find Dominican chimi trucks and mofongo, Mexican taquerías, and one of the city's largest Ghanaian communities, with kitchens serving waakye, fufu with light soup, jollof, and banku with grilled tilapia.
Start at 161st Street, between the courthouse and Yankee Stadium, and walk north past the Bronx Museum, looking up at the lobbies and facades as you go. Lunch on Ghanaian food further up the boulevard and you have a day that covers a century of the Bronx in a few miles.
Art Deco apartment houses with curved corners and sunburst lobbies
Ghanaian waakye, fufu, and jollof up the boulevard
Dominican and Mexican kitchens on the side avenues
Yankee Stadium and the courthouse at the southern end
Local notes
Papaye
A Ghanaian restaurant at 2300 Grand Concourse that has long been a gathering place for the Bronx's West African community, especially during soccer matches. Omo tuo with goat in peanut soup, waakye, and fufu are the orders; regulars come from across the borough.
The Bronx Museum of the Arts
Founded in 1971 and housed since 1982 at 1040 Grand Concourse at 165th Street, focused on contemporary art and artists connected to the Bronx. A major renovation added a new entrance at the corner; check current hours before visiting.
Grand Concourse Historic District
The stretch from about 153rd to 167th Street holds the boulevard's richest run of Art Deco and Art Moderne apartment houses, designated a city historic district in 2011. Look for the lobbies, the corner windows, and the patterned brick.
Through the lens
The Art Deco facades along the Concourse face east and west, so morning and late afternoon both work; corner buildings reward a wide lens. Joyce Kilmer Park near 161st Street gives an open foreground. Lobbies are private; shoot through the doors only with permission.
Editorial draft — core details last reviewed October 13, 2026. Confirm practical details with the official site before you go.