Casey Kaplan Making Unorthdox Move to Flower District

After 10 years in Chelsea, Casey Kaplan Gallery is leaving the gallery-packed neighborhood for the relatively uncharted waters of the flower district, signing a 10-year lease on West 27th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. The new space measures an impressive 10,000 square feet.

In an interview with the Art Newspaper, Kaplan called the area an “exciting neighborhood that is in transition. The storefront wholesalers are moving on and new businesses are coming in.” He expects the new location will allow the gallery to “become a destination gallery, but not so far removed that it’s ridiculous to ask people to come to see our shows.”

It remains to be seen if Kaplan’s move will plant the seed for a blooming gallery business in the Flower District, but the New York art scene is ever-evolving. Kaplan is not the only gallery to abandon Chelsea and its rapidly rising rents for other neighborhoods. The chronically unhip Upper East Side, for instance, has seen a growing number of galleries opening up shop, including the latest Gagosian location and the first East Coast outpost of Los Angeles’s Blum & Poe (see artnet News report).