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Saturday, October 23, 2010

... including Allenby street

"Shmuel-David" building, est. 1923, on Allenby 79
Me: "Doubtless, Ibn Gabirol is one of the most aesthetically unpleasing streets of Tel Aviv."

Lesya, with apparent astonishment: "Seriously, Ibn Gabirol? Really? What would you say about Allenby then?"

She's got a point. Allenby street, in the south-central Tel Aviv, is a crowded, noisy, generally pretty unattractive place. Allenby is: Tel Aviv's central market - the Carmel market - with its loud and jammed rows; tasteless jewelery shops; striptease clubs; countless cheep clothing stores with fake "Gucci" or  "Chanel" shoes and bags... But Allenby also is: numerous book shops that sell new and secondhand books - in Hebrew, English, Russian, French, Spanish, German!; affordable clothing and home furnishing stores; architectural "remains of the former glory" - unfortunately not renovated yet, but still beautiful buildings of 1920-30 years, with tracery balconies and arabesque arches. That's why I have a warm spot in my heart for this street, and do hope that one day the city authorities would renovate and revive Allenby.
Spanish bookstore, Allenby 81
"Unlikely", - responded Lesya to the above wishful thinking, - "I believe that Allenby is one of those places that just have a bad luck about them. Nothing useful would ever come from it."

She's probably right. But I prefer to remain optimistic about the future of Allenby street!
Corner of Allenby and Bialik st.

1 comment:

Dina said...

Hi Olga! Tel Aviv should come to Jerusalem to learn how to restore old buildings. ;)
Shabbat shalom.