The Loisaida neighborhood is home to a historically and culturally rich community.  Neighborhood struggles for affordable housing, education and labor rights have long marked its history.  The housing movement, for example, helped form the area in the 1970s and ’80s.  Homesteaders and squatters worked toward the common goal of reclaiming run-down and abandoned buildings developing them as affordable housing.

Today the neighborhood remains incredibly diverse and lively.  At the same time it has a truly peaceful and natural feeling growing out of its 50 community gardens. Loisaida is home to countless community groups, art organizations and poetry and music venues which keep the spirit of activism and community alive.

For maps, photos, and a history of the community gardens, see Elissa Sampson’s “A Flowering of Resistance,” at: