The 'Mythic Allure' of Greenwich Village: Why Artists Like Taylor Swift Are Still Captivated (Exclusive)

New York City’s Greenwich Village has earned its reputation as the birthplace of artistic legends. From Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell to Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac, it’s where creative icons broke boundaries and left their mark. 

For someone like Taylor Swift, whose songwriting thrives on storytelling, the Village's rich cultural history is an endless source of inspiration. Who wouldn’t want to walk the same streets where Dylan penned his iconic lyrics or play at a venue like The Bitter End, which has seen decades of musical legends?

Greenwich Village’s draw for artists like Swift is all about carrying on a storied tradition, as author David Browne dives into in his new book, Talkin' Greenwich Village: The Heady Rise and Slow Fall of America's Bohemian Music Capital. Browne’s look into the neighborhood’s history shows how this iconic Manhattan spot still fuels creativity and inspiration today. Just listen to Swift’s "Welcome to New York," where she sings, “Walkin’ through a crowd, the village is aglow.”

Browne tells PEOPLE: “In that compact area, less than a square mile, it has served as a safe space for writers, artists outsiders and radical thinkers looking for like-minded souls or to reinvent themselves and work out their art. Even though the number of venues has dropped dramatically since those days, Greenwich Village is still a symbolic artist’s colony, so it’s not surprising at all that Taylor would be among those drawn to it.”

With iconic spots like Electric Lady Studios (where Swift still records!), Cafe Wha? and The Bitter End, Greenwich Village remains a must for any artist drawn to intimate, legendary venues. Swift herself took the stage at The Bitter End back in 2005, early in her career — a moment that clearly resonated with her. Fast forward to 2016, and she famously rented an apartment on Cornelia Street, right in the heart of the Village.

That home is now a fan favorite, thanks to her 2019 track "Cornelia Street," which captures the time she lived there while her Tribeca property was being renovated. "I rent a place on Cornelia street, I say casually in the car...," she sings in the hit, forever tying her name to the famed street.

Browne, a senior writer at Rolling Stone and biographer of musical legends like Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, reflects: "When Taylor arrived there, the Village music scene wasn’t quite what it was in decades past. But given her skills as a songwriter, singer and storyteller, her period in the Village, as brief as it was, reinforced the idea that the neighborhood was the place to go not just for music fans but for the artists themselves; it reaffirmed the Village’s place in the cultural pantheon, right up there with, say, the Laurel Canyon music scene in LA. in the Sixties and Seventies.”

For Swifties making their pilgrimage to Cornelia Street, Browne has a few more musical landmarks to add to the itinerary.

"In light of the forthcoming Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown [starring Timothée Chalamet], I’d suggest Jones Street, right around the corner from Cornelia. That’s where Dylan and his girlfriend Suze Rotolo, huddled together, were photographed for the cover of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan," he says.

"At the corner of Bleecker and Thompson, you can still see the sign for the legendary Village Gate, which closed in the Nineties but was long home to the likes of Nina Simone," he continues. "The Gaslight Café, at 116 MacDougal, is now a restaurant, but starting in the late Fifties and into the early Seventies, it was a gathering and performance space for Dylan and so many more. It’s also the setting for Midge’s reinvention as a standup comic in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.

"Then there's Electric Lady Studios, on 8^th Street, the recording studio opened by Jimi Hendrix that's still busy to this day. And the fountain in Washington Square Park long served as the site of a Sunday afternoon jamboree, where hundreds of musicians (including locals like John Sebastian, who went on to start the Lovin’ Spoonful) would gather and break out into song and accompany each other," he says.

When asked who the Folklore singer would have likely connected with during the Village’s heyday, Browne points to folk legend Joni Mitchell.

“Joni Mitchell only lived in the Village for a brief period, around 1967, but the mind boggles at the two of them huddling in one of those coffeehouses, comparing notes on songs, club owners and their personal lives. While she was there, Joni wrote an astounding 60 songs, which is a testament to the way the Village nurtured songwriters; it’s easy to imagine Taylor being similarly inspired,” he says. 

And as for Bob Dylan? Browne muses, “Given how unknowable he could be, who knows? But Taylor’s interest in the political landscape—culminating in her Kamala Harris endorsement—also makes you think she would have appreciated the protest or topical songs that emanated from the Village and spoke to the troubled times swirling around it.”

Swift’s decision to call Greenwich Village home, even temporarily, speaks to its lasting magic. It wasn’t just about renting an apartment—it was about becoming part of a creative legacy that has nurtured talents for generations.

Browne says, “The Village has retained its mythic allure — the place where people could gather in cozy performance spaces and be introduced to a new song, jam or unconventional poem that would expand their knowledge of the world around them."

Talkin' Greenwich Village: The Heady Rise and Slow Fall of America's Bohemian Music Capital by David Browne is out now.