Madison Avenue, looking north from 40th Street

Madison Avenue is a north-south avenue in the borough of Manhattan in New York City that carries northbound one-way traffic. It runs from Madison Square (at 23rd Street) to the Madison Avenue Bridge at 138th Street. In doing so, it passes through Midtown, the Upper East Side (including Carnegie Hill), Spanish Harlem, and Harlem. It is named for and arises from Madison Square, which is itself named for James Madison, the fourth President of the United States. Since the 1920s, the street's name has been synonymous with the American advertising industry.

Madison Square Garden takes its name from the former location on the north east corner of Madison Square at 26th Street and Madison Avenue. (The New York Life Insurance Building now occupies that entire city block.) It was designed by Stanford White and had a bronze statue of the Roman goddess Diana on the tower of the sports arena. When it moved to a new building at 50th Street and Eighth Avenue in 1925 it kept its old name. (Madison Square Garden is now located at Eighth Avenue between 31st Street and 33rd Street).

Between 57th Street and 85th Street, Madison Avenue is identified as “the fashionable road”. In this area is where most of the very well known fashion designers and upper class hair salons are located.

• Some of the world's most upscale boutiques are located on Madison Avenue including Gucci, Hermès, Prada, Chanel, Chloé, Juicy Couture, Emporio Armani, Tom Ford, Oscar de la Renta, Coach, Christian Louboutin, Yves Saint Laurent, Missoni, Dolce & Gabbana, J. Press, Paul Stuart, Vera Wang, Betsey Johnson, Gianfranco Ferre, Emanuel Ungaro, Carolina Herrera, Miu Miu, Jimmy Choo, Christian Dior, Bvlgari, Roberto Cavalli, Valentino, Donna Karan, Luca Luca, Giorgio Armani, Ralph Lauren, Mulberry, Etro, Givenchy, Michael Kors, Ann Taylor and many more.
• Barneys New York also has their anchor store on Madison Avenue and 60th Street.
• Louis Vuitton 2009

Madison Avenue was not part of the original New York City street grid established in the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, and was carved between Park Avenue (formerly Fourth) and Fifth Avenue in 1836, due to the effort of lawyer and real estate developer Samuel B. Ruggles, a graduate of Yale University who had previously purchased and developed New York's Gramercy Park in 1831, who was in part responsible for the development of Union Square, and who also named Lexington Avenue.

Madison Avenue carries one-way traffic uptown (northbound) from 23rd Street to 135th Street, with the changeover from two-way traffic taking place on January 14, 1966, at which time Fifth Avenue was changed to one way downtown (southbound).^[1]

Advertising industry

The term "Madison Avenue" is often used metonymically for advertising, and Madison Avenue became identified with the advertising industry after the explosive growth in this area in the 1920s.

According to "The Emergence of Advertising in America", an online exhibit at the John W. Hartman Center for Sales, Advertising & Marketing History at Duke University, by the year 1861 there were twenty advertising agencies in New York City, and in 1911, the New York City Association of Advertising Agencies was founded, predating the establishment of the American Association of Advertising Agencies by several years.

Among various depictions in popular culture, the portion of the advertising industry which centers on Madison Avenue serves as a backdrop for the critically-acclaimed AMC television drama Mad Men, which focuses on industry activities during the 1960s.

In recent decades, many agencies have left Madison Avenue, with some moving further downtown and others moving west.^[2] Today, only a few agencies are still located in the old business cluster on Madison Avenue, including Young & Rubicam and Doyle Dane Bernbach. However, the term is still used to describe the agency business as a whole and large, New York-based agencies in particular.

Transportation

Madison Avenue is served by the M1, M2, M3, and M4 NYCT Buses, and the BM1, BM2, BM3, BM4, and BM5 express buses.

References

External links

• http://www.madisonavenuebid.org/
• http://www.thecityreview.com/madison
• http://www.aviewoncities.com/nyc/madisonsquare.htm
• http://www.madisonsquarepark.org/about.asp
• http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/eaa/timeline
• http://www.olr.com/newolr/timeline/1811_1869.asp
• http://home.nyc.rr.com/jkn/nysonglines/madison.htm#26st
• http://www.virtualology.com/samuelbulkleyruggles/