It’s all relative. But to say the flatiron neighborhood is a thriving cultural scene is a stretch. Is a ballet school for rich kids part of a creative scene? Is Eataly, a food court for tourists?

A better measure of the neighborhood’s creative DNA is the number of cultural events in Madison Square Park, where just yesterday there was an LL Bean promotional event taking place next to a Brooks Brothers promotional event (you can’t make this stuff up).

In this New Yorker’s opinion the last time your neighborhood had a creative pulse was when artists and photographers lived there in order to be within walking distance of the (now long-dead) photo district, where all the labs and darkrooms were. How many musicians and ballet dancers live there now, when a take-out salad in a plastic bowl is easily $20?

The linked article is maddening to me b/c it’s so damn accurate.