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Sidewalk Luminaries

JANUARY 13, 2009

Stars of stage, screen, and style leave their mark underfoot if you know where to look

The Fashion Walk of Fame, fittingly set on Fashion (7th) Avenue, honors influential cutters and drapers of past and present. The stars of Geoffrey Beene, Donna Karen, Ralph Lauren, Norman Norrell and a host of others should be a thrilling stroll for any fashion addict.

At 80 St. Marks Place in the East Village you'll find the "Off-Broadway Walk of Fame" in front of the current Theater 80, home of the Pearl Theater Company. The walk features the cemented signatures and prints of yesteryear luminaries like Gloria Swanson, Joan Crawford and Myrna Loy.

The Madison Avenue Walk of Fame gives you a chance to get your feet on the advertising industry's catchiest catchphrases and most memorable characters–Colonel Sanders, the Kool-Aid Man, and the AFLAC duck rank among them–immortalized on plaques located on Madison Avenue between 42nd and 50th Streets.

The tragic murder of The Second Avenue Deli's first owner, Abe Lebewohl, led to his immortalization on the sidewalk at the restaurant's entrance; 50 stars of the old Yiddish Theater era shine in a double row of granite stars embedded in the same sidewalk, known as "the Yiddish walk of fame." Though the historic Kosher delicatessen has closed at the original Second Avenue and 10th Street location, the stars and the memories remain.