NYC’s Lower East Side is a legendary immigrant neighborhood that is becoming a hip art and night club district.
Puerto Ricans call the neighorhood “Loisaida” after Bittman “Bimbo” Rivas’ 1974 Nuyorican poem.
Lower East Side boundaries are:
Houston St
Bowery | Lower East Side | FDR Drive
Manhattan Bridge
Latin Culture in the Lower East Side
Teatro Fest NYC 2025 is New York’s Festival of Latino Theatre
IATI THEATER, East Village, Manhattan 🇻🇪
INTAR Theatre, Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan 🇨🇺
PREGONES/PRTT, Mott Haven, The Bronx and Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan 🇵🇷
REPERTORIO ESPAÑOL, Kips Bay, Manhattan 🇨🇺
TEATRO CIRCULO, East Village, Manhattan 🇵🇷
TEATRO LATEA, Lower East Side, Manhattan 🇵🇷
TEATRO SEA, Lower East Side, Manhattan 🇵🇷
THALIA SPANISH THEATER, Sunnyside, Queens 🇪🇸
Continue Reading Teatro Fest NYC 2025 is New York’s Festival of Latino Theatre
Nélida Tirado “Dime Quién Soy” is Traditional Flamenco About The Many Identities We Carry in Our Heritage
ABRONS ARTS CENTER, Lower East Side, Manhattan 🇪🇸 🇵🇷
CHEZ MESSY, Washington Heights, Manhattan (Wednesdays) 🇪🇸 🇵🇷
International Puerto Rican Heritage Film Festival is a Deep Dive into Boricua Identity and Filmmaking
“EL BARRIO,” EAST HARLEM, Manhattan
El Museo del Barrio
Silberman School of Social Work
LOWER EAST SIDE, Manhattan
Regal Essex Crossing
Lower East Side Art
New Museum of Contemporary Art is NYC’s only museum focused entirely on contemporary art.
Lower East Side Dance
Paul Taylor Dance Company
Lower East Side Festivals
Loisaida Festival is a Lower East Side cultural street fair.
Lower East Side Museums
New Museum of Contemporary Art is NYC’s only museum focused entirely on contemporary art.
Tenement Museum
Lower East Side Performing Arts
The Clemente is a Latin cultural center that hosts Teatro SEA, Teatro LATEA, Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (HOLA), and the Fantastic Experimental Latino Theater (FELT).
Lower East Side Restaurants
Mi Salsa Kitchen is a Cuban diner with live entertainment on weekends. 🇨🇺
Lower East Side Theatre
Teatro LATEA is a community theater.
Teatro SEA is NYC’s Latino children theater. It does a lot of puppetry.
Lower East Side News
January 2023
Sueño de Reyes – Dream of Kings; children’s theater that imagines the Three Kings arriving in Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico instead of Bethlehem; is at Teatro SEA in Manhattan’s Lower East Side; Saturday-Sunday, December 10-11 & 17-18, 2022 at 3pm; Thursday, January 5, 2023 at 7pm; and Saturday-Sunday, January 7-8 at 3pm. $20 adults/$15 children. 🇵🇷
The Lunar New Year Firecracker Ceremony and Cultural Festival 2023 is a firecracker lighting ceremony with Chinese dance, culture, and food; at Sara D. Roosevelt Park in the Lower East Side / Manhattan Chinatown; on Sunday, January 22, 2023 from 11am – 3:30pm. FREE! 🇨🇳🇰🇭🇰🇷🇰🇵🇯🇵🇲🇳🇵🇭🇸🇬🇹🇼🇹🇭🇺🇸
February 2023
The 25th Lunar New Year Parade NYC 2023 has dragons dancing through Manhattan Chinatown to the Lower East Side on Sunday, February 12, 2023 at 1pm. FREE! 🇨🇳🇰🇭🇰🇷🇰🇵🇯🇵🇲🇳🇵🇭🇸🇬🇹🇼🇹🇭🇺🇸
Miguel Zenón & La Prueba del Ritmo play Afro-Latin jazz in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr; in Teatro LATEA at The Clemente Center in the Lower East Side; on Saturday, February 25, 2023 at 8pm (7:30pm doors). From $25. 🇵🇷
About the Lower East Side
The neighborhood’s tenements were the first homes for generations of immigrant families. It was once New York City’s “Little Germany.” It became a legendary Jewish community. It’s become a Puerto Rican and Dominican neighborhood and is now gentrifying.
Of all of Manhattan, the Lower East Side retains some of the feel of anything-goes 1970s New York City. It’s mostly visual now in terms of art and graffiti. The New Museum of Contemporary Art changed the neighborhood completely.
Loisaida
“Loisaida” is the Puerto Rican name for the neighborhood. It comes from a poem by Nuyorican poet pioneer Bimbo Rivas.
He may have been paying tribute to Yuíza, the legendary cacique (Indigenous Taíno chief) of what is now Loíza, Puerto Rico. By the way, Yuíza was a woman. We have strong traditions of female leadership in both Indigenous Africa and the Indigenous Americas. The similarities between the two cultures are striking.
East Village
The Lower East Side used to run up to 14th St. Above Houston St, it was rebranded as the “East Village” in the 1960s. This was partly due to the development of New York City’s contemporary art community which began in SoHo and moved up to Greenwich Village, then moved east into the Lower East Side.
East Village
Little Italy | Lower East Side | Brooklyn
Chinatown | Two Bridges