Aug 4, 2025

Chinatown Shoe Repair New York

Tiny shop in Chinatown

"This one "Chinatown Shoe Repair" in New York is just 33 inches deep and perhaps 40 inches wide. It opens at 12:30pm, but who knows what it is before that?"

On Grand Street, between Eldridge and Forsyth Streets is an extremely miniaturized store. This might be its first reporting. As I have written elsewhere, there are plenty of 6-foot-wide shops scattered here and there, and I find new ones often. But this! This is something else altogether. It is in New York, though the scene looks like it could be in Asia.

It might be about 33 inches deep and perhaps 40 inches wide and with a ceiling too low to permit upright standing --- roughly 10 or 11 square feet. That would amount to around $350 per month, at say $35 per square foot, a bargain anywhere.

I can think of one more extremity here: It might be a different store before 12:30pm, when it opens as a shoe repair shop. I have read of such arrangements before. During stressful times, (and these are that), beds have been rented out for shift sleeping, always warm for the next renter. Why not stores?

I must return at different hours to observe more closely.

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Grand Street 279

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