Filming in the Meatpacking District, New York City
Belgian block streets and low brick market buildings run under metal loading canopies, one block from the Hudson River and the High Line.
What Meatpacking District looks like
and the blocks around it run on Belgian block, the old paving stones surviving where the eighteenth century street grid crosses the regular 1811 grid at an angle. Broad metal awnings project from the market buildings over the sidewalk, shading the loading bays underneath.
The market and cold storage buildings are low, mostly two and three storeys, in exposed brick with steel beams and large multi pane windows. Newer glass fronted shops sit at ground level between them, so an old loading dock can share a block with a storefront of plate glass.
still runs past the side of an old market building toward Ninth Avenue, and continues south past more of the same brick warehouses. At the wedge where Ninth Avenue, Hudson Street and West 14th Street meet, the Triangle Building fills its narrow lot. Its brick dates from 1849, and a fire escape zigzags up one face. 73 is a plain brick building from 1836, older than the market blocks around it.
The High Line's steel columns rise over Gansevoort Street and Washington Street. The elevated park above runs on tracks laid in the 1930s. West of the market blocks, the Hudson River waterfront and the arched entrance to are both a short walk away.
Shot in Meatpacking District
The Triangle Building stands at the wedge where Ninth Avenue, Hudson Street and West 14th Street meet. Serpico filmed it as a real backdrop, playing nothing more than itself. Fatal Attraction later shot its interior scenes inside the same building for a fictional resident's apartment.
The Triangle Building
Ninth Avenue, Hudson Street and West 14th Street. One real building, filmed as itself twice over.
Serpico, 1973
Frank Serpico goes undercover as a meat porter to watch a bookie's drop spot from across the street. Sidney Lumet shot the surveillance and the arrest at this wedge shaped building, real meatpacking district blocks playing themselves. Street View
Fatal Attraction, 1987
Alex Forrest, the character Glenn Close plays, is given an apartment whose interior scenes were filmed inside this building. The film's own exterior shot of her apartment building is a different address nearby, on Little West 12th Street. Street View
What Meatpacking District can double for
Fulton Market District in Chicago, Illinois
Fulton Market grew up the same way, as a wholesale meat district for Chicago's big three packers. Its brick warehouses and cobbled loading docks look close to the market blocks on Gansevoort Street today, and both places went through the same shift from market to nightlife and retail. Fulton Market's streets run wider and its buildings sit taller in places, so a tight frame on one loading bay holds the match better than a full block wide shot. Try searching brick warehouses market block now.
The Distillery District's red brick warehouses and cobblestone lanes went up mostly between the 1860s and the 1890s, close in scale to the meatpacking blocks. Productions already use its lanes for old New York industrial streets, so the block is used to holding a camera. Its lanes run wider and its cobbles sit more evenly than Gansevoort Street's Belgian block, and the buildings are a storey or two taller in places. Try searching cobblestone warehouses lanes now.
Smithfield Market in London, England
Smithfield's cast iron market halls and covered lanes are a heavier, more monumental version of the same idea, a market built for trucks and porters rather than shoppers. The material is iron and glass rather than brick, so a wide shot looks like a grander cousin of Gansevoort Street rather than a direct match. Keep the grand market halls out of a wide shot and work the smaller side lanes and loading bays instead, where the two places come closer together. Try searching iron market hall lanes now.
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