The Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment in New York City recently commissioned this report on the city’s nightlife economy. The study was completed by Econsult Solutions, the North Highland Company, and Urbane Development. (Full disclosure: I was a teaching assistant for the President of Econsult while at Penn.)

Here’s what they found:

The total economic impact of this industry is the sum of its direct, indirect, and induced economic impacts, as well as the ancillary spending impacts that are adjacent to nightlife activity. In 2016 (the most recent year where standardized datasets were available), the nightlife industry supported 299,000 jobs with $13.1 billion in employee compensation and $35.1 billion in economic output. This economic impact also yielded $697 million in tax revenue for New York City.

They also found that, between 2011 and 2016, the nightlife industry has outpaced the city’s overall economy. Nightlife establishments grew by a 2% annual growth rate. Jobs in the nightlife industry grew by a 5% annual growth rate. And nightlife wages have been rising by 8% annually – about double the average for the city.

I am a firm believer in the value of the nighttime economy. So I’m happy to see more people paying attention to it as of late. For the full report, click here.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

In 2017, the New York Times Style Magazine ran a piece on Harry Nuriev – and his design firm Crosby Studios – titled: The man designing spaces for the Instagram age. 

Since then, Harry and his firm have been in Time Magazine, have had a solo show at Design Miami, and have been named to the Architectural Digest 100, among many other things.

There has obviously been a lot of talk over the last few years about the impact that Instagram is having on physical spaces and design #IRL (in real life). 

Some, or perhaps many, worry that it is having a “homogenizing effect on design.” Everyone is following a kind of global minimalism that looks good on social, but is maybe getting a bit monotonous. 

There’s no question that online is having an impact on how we design offline. But I am far less fussed about it than most. 

Architecture, design, and art have always reflected the cultural milieu at the time, and it just so happens that we are living through a period where the internet is transforming so much of what we know.

It is always important to question what is going on. But I think Crosby Studios is doing some really great work.

Guy Jones is a videographer who specializes in archival footage, or at least that is what his YouTube account suggests. He edits old videos and makes them more watchable by doing things like adding sound and slowing them down to a natural rate. 

(Older films often appear sped up because they were recorded at less than 24 frames per second and then later played at 24 or more frames per second.)

I’ve blogged about one of his videos before. This one of New York City in 1911. But he has so many other fascinating films on his channel – including a frozen Ottawa from 1942 – that I figured I would share it in its entirety today. 

For the city builders in the room, here are some street life videos of Paris in la Belle Époque (1896-1900), New York City in 1927, and London in 1967. Among other things, it is fascinating to see how quickly the car crept its way into our cities.

The video of Paris is all horses and moving walkways. The video of New York City (1927) is all cars. And if you look at the other video of New York from 1911, you’ll see a city in the midst of that transition.