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RECENTLY RELEASED
Designs Underfoot: The Art of Manhole Covers in New York City
By Diana Stuart

20 October 2003

Diana Stuart holds a title that is unusual, even for New York City. She is Gotham's Manhole Cover Lady. For the past decade, she has photographed manhole covers, researched the foundries where they were made, and led walking tours where she points out their unsung beauty. As head of the Society for the Preservation of New York City Manhole Covers, she has even fought (unsuccessfully) to give the 600,000 manhole covers in New York City landmark status.

This spring, Stuart published a book about the designs, origins and history of the city's manholes, called Designs Underfoot: The Art of Manhole Covers in New York City (Design Books, 127 pp., 2003). "One day I glanced down and found myself staring at a beautifully designed manhole cover. Then I slowly discovered the wealth of different designs decorating New York City's streets. Astonished by the range of designs, I began to photograph covers in all five boroughs," Stuart writes about her beginnings as a manhole cover expert.

The book is largely a catalog of covers in the style of an architectural guidebook, with black and white photographs organized by details like "Flower Images," "Diamonds and Snowflakes," and "Of Unusual Historical Significance." Some designs are more captivating than others, but Stuart also uses the manhole covers to talk about city history.

The descriptions give a history of iron works companies that operated in New York City, like Cornell's Iron Works, which opened in the 1840s on Centre Street in Lower Manhattan, and Williamsburg's Healey Iron Works. They also give details about 19th century utility companies, like Brooklyn Union Gas, New York Telephone, and of course Consolidated Edison Company of New York.

Because the book gives precise locations for each of the nearly 400 manhole covers Stuart describes, any potential manhole cover enthusiast who wants to go take a closer look at the covers can do so. However, in what Stuart has called "real tragedies," some of them have already been paved over.

Designs Underfoot
 


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