Fifth Avenue: the grand mile and Rockefeller Center
The library, the flagship stores, Rockefeller Center, St Patrick's, and the gilded blocks up to the park. This is a Claude-drafted route awaiting the editor's walk.

1. New York Public Library (Stephen A. Schwarzman Building)
Begin between the lions on the Fifth Avenue steps. This is where Fifth turns from numbered grid into the grand avenue; sit on the marble a moment, then walk north with the even-numbered side on your left.

2. Fifth Avenue flagship stretch (47th–49th)
The avenue's retail spine — the glass cube of the Apple store further up, the old department-store facades, the diamond windows of the 47th Street block. You don't have to buy a thing; the windows and the limestone are the show.

3. Rockefeller Center
Turn in at the Channel Gardens and let them funnel you to the sunken plaza — the gilded Prometheus, the flags, ice in winter and café tables in summer. Above you, 30 Rock; the Top of the Rock deck looks back at the Empire State, the better skyline view of the two.

4. St Patrick's Cathedral
Straight across Fifth from Rockefeller Center. Renwick's white-marble Gothic, finished 1878, spires that once topped the skyline here. Step inside out of the avenue's noise; the Lady Chapel at the back is the quiet end.

5. Museum of Modern Art (edge)
Half a block west on 53rd. You don't have to go in for the full afternoon, but the ground-floor sculpture garden is the calmest courtyard in Midtown — and free in the last hour some evenings. Look, then carry on up Fifth.

6. Grand Army Plaza & the Plaza Hotel
Fifth Avenue lands here, at the southeast corner of Central Park: the gilded Sherman statue, the Pulitzer Fountain, the white pile of the Plaza behind. The grand mile ends where the green begins. The N/R/W is at 59th.

Fifth Avenue: the grand mile and Rockefeller Center