New Haven Apple Store

With its completely flat facade, the otherwise unmissable slate of whiteness blends in with its neighbors when approaching the Apple Store from either side. From any other angle, the matte grey stainless steel and glass storefront stands out starkly against the bricks and stones that govern the surrounding buildings. The minimalistic modernity the building represents is akin to a blank canvas — prepped and ready for the innovative ideas of those wandering in. The Apple Store’s existence next to the Yale Bookstore is significant: it is a symbol of the Yale-led revolution that turned Broadway from a chaotic neighborhood street defined by its multi-generation family owned businesses to the more sterile and commercialized mall-like area it is today.[ii] The shop makes clear Yale’s influence on New Haven and the significance the university places on the consumer requirements of its students.

Sallies Milo J Barber (1913-24),

Broadway Realty Co. (1915-late 1930s),

Quality Grocery Co. Inc. (1941-1984),

Yale Co-op East (1974- unclear)

Mom & Pop Sweet Shop (1985- unclear),

La Piazza (2004-unclear),

Thali Too (back unit) (2007-2017)

Apple Store (2011-now)  

As one of the first roads extending off New Haven’s original nine-square design, Broadway holds almost unparalleled significance in the social history of the city.[i] At the turn of the 19th century, the street was born as a residential offshoot of the grid designed to create more housing for New Haven’s growing population and connect New Haven to settlements in the north.[xiv] It was here in approximately 1812 that the town hay scales and public well found their home at the base of the Broadway center block, making it a mercantile center. At its inception, Broadway was a very significant place: it broke the rhythm of the old colonial town that stopped at the corner of York Street and Elm Street and granted access to the farms in the greater New Haven area.

In around the 1830s and 40s, Broadway began its change from a residential street to an increasingly consumer oriented area with the establishment of firstly a school and a hotel. The late 19^th century brought the streetcar to Broadway. At the turn of the 20th century, it began to develop as a little shopping area on the outskirts of the nine square town — accessible to all by the streetcar that ran through it.[xv]

As Broadway’s pulsing beat runs pushes through the decades, it only grew in significance when Yale established its plans to purchase Broadway in 1992.[xvi] As architect and professor Vincent Scully said, “When Payne Whitney Gym was built behind Broadway, the street became an important thoroughfare for its students.”[xvii] However, this change in ownership also resulted in Broadway's transition from a chaotic, colorful street defined by its family-run businesses to a cleaner and more commercialized version of itself. [xviii] The then Yale Vice President Bruce Alexander noted[vii] the developments as a necessary element in the university’s urban renewal aim to invest in and tidy up the area around the school. In his view, cleansing Broadway and replacing the family stores with national chains created a better environment for the students.

Broadway’s redevelopment by Yale in the 1990s and early 2000s revolutionized the district and played into the broader upscaling of New Haven. This symbolized Yale’s realization that the fate of it and New Haven are irreconcilably intertwined – a crime ridden and dirty city would only cause people to turn their noses on the university. Some community members saw this redevelopment as Yale’s authoritarian destruction of Broadway – seeing it as the death of the old city. While the district, and New Haven in general, have lost the unique character it once had, it has also ceased to be the blighted block of the 80s.[xvi] Broadway’s remodeling was pioneered by Yale architecture professor Herbert Newman and Department of Traffic and Parking official Leonard Liss. Their efforts not only focused on the upscaling of buildings and shops, but, with the planting of elm trees and the creation of a park, on the beautification of the urban landscapes.[xvii]

Broadway’s ad hoc development has stood as a signal of the changing times. The district itself reflects the shifting social values witnessed by America in only a hundred years. From farming, to family businesses to commercial retail, Broadway has seen it all.

The designated consumer space of 65 Broadway came to life with the deconstruction of the initially constructed residential houses. Since then, while the store area has changed hands, transforming from a barber shop, to a grocery store, to a restaurant, and now to the Apple store, it has always been one of the undeniably integral veins at the heart of the Broadway district. Currently, 65 Broadway is home to both the New Haven Apple Store (facing Broadway and the parking lot in the middle), and the vacant back lot of roughly the same size.

As with the rest of Broadway, number 65 has a deep past of being home to a local family business. It’s recent commercialization into the space for a national chain pushes back on this rich history of serving the New Haven community. 65 Broadway stands as a microcosm of shifting societal values, with its changing ownership symbolizing society’s turn away from the family unit to commercially centered spaces.[ix]

The address began its journey as a store in approximately 1913 as a barber shop that, two years later, shared its space with a realtor’s office. The current division of the retail space is reminiscent of the split of ownership at its founding. Subsequently, a locally run grocery store, Quality Grocery, began its 40-year reign at number 65 before expanding and moving closer to the York Street intersection. In the mid-80s, the space was geared towards the local restaurant and food service industry, with pizza place La Piazza, finding its home at 65 for a few years.[x] During this time number 65 was also bought up by Yale and merged with 67 and 69 to establish the Yale Co-op East.[xi] The current structure, a $4.8 million Apple Store, opened on September 24, 2011.[xii]

Until Yale began its revolution of Broadway in the 1990s, remnants of the original building from 1915 were incorporated into the ever-developing modern structure. Even the expansion of the Yale Co-op in 1974 to take up 65-69 Broadway included elements of the original fireproof bank from 1915, and the western wall and elevated office space of the previous building. The post-modern building of the 1980s was designed in conjunction with Yale’s new (at the time) colleges, Morse and Ezra Stiles, and the preservation of past building material clearly emphasized the importance of the grand arc of history in the development of Broadway.[xiii] However, the Apple Store’s establishment wiped away these narrative elements, and symbolizes Yale’s efforts modernize and clean up Broadway.

The Broadway we have today is unrecognizable from the one that existed even just a mere 20 years ago. In the late 1990s, Yale University bought up the triangular block and transformed it into the upscale student-centered shopping area it is today. The small block that makes up the Broadway neighborhood is one that represents — albeit in retrospect — many of the architectural styles that governed the 20th century.[iv] From Italianate, to Queen Anne, to Collegiate Gothic and Modernist, Broadway today is a microcosm of architectural pursuit. 

Broadway today is classified by its welcoming atmosphere: wide pedestrian sidewalks, bright storefronts, evenly spaced trees, and the distinctly recognizable red brick that establishes a rhythm and balance between the buildings despite their varying architectural styles. The diversity of the stores, from clothing to books to cosmetics and multiple genres of food, the urban setting is not only catered towards Yale students but is welcoming to the whole of the New Haven community.

The single-story building is characterized by its sleek, minimalist and glossy design that mimics the simple aesthetic of its products. In line with the instantly recognizable Apple Store aesthetic, white limestone sparkles in the sunlight and frames the wall of glass that faces Broadway and casts light into the modernist interior. Hanging in the center of the glass wall is the luminous ‘Apple’ logo, simultaneously signaling the stores brand and marking out the store’s glassy double-door entrance. Turning into the side lane between the Yale Bookshop and the Apple Store, visitors find the 14 residential college crests lining the white stone exterior wall of the building — a concrete symbol of Yale’s ownership. No part of the original 1915 structure has stood the test of time, with this most recent rendition of 65 Broadway being as new as 2011.[iii] The highly rectilinear white structure stands out amid the bricks and stones that characterize Broadway as a testament to Apple Inc.’s innovation and creativity.

[i] MacMillan, Thomas. "Broadway Getting $4.8M Apple Makeover." New Haven Independent. April 27, 2011.

[ii] “On Broadway: A New Haven Streetscape.” Film. Produced by Elihu Rubin and Eleanor Oxman. New Haven: Yale University Digital Media Center for the Arts, 2000.

[iii] City of New Haven GIS Portal.

[iv] “On Broadway: A New Haven Streetscape.” Film. Produced by Elihu Rubin and Eleanor Oxman. New Haven: Yale University Digital Media Center for the Arts, 2000.

[v] “On Broadway: A New Haven Streetscape.” Film. Produced by Elihu Rubin and Eleanor Oxman. New Haven: Yale University Digital Media Center for the Arts, 2000.

[vi] “New Haven Directory.” (New Haven: Price & Lee Co.) 1913, 1915, 1924, 1932, 1937, 1941, 1953, 1971.

[vii] Ryan, Susan. “Yale Central Complex.” Historic Resources Inventory: Building and Structures. New Haven Preservation Trust. New Haven, CT: Connecticut Historical Commission. July 29 1980.

[viii] MacMillan, Thomas. "Broadway Getting $4.8M Apple Makeover." New Haven Independent. April 27, 2011.

[ix] Ryan, Susan. “Yale Central Complex.” Historic Resources Inventory: Building and Structures. New Haven Preservation Trust. New Haven, CT: Connecticut Historical Commission. July 29 1980.

[x] Doolittle Maps of 1812 & 1824.

[xi] "Broadway and Elm." URB/AN/ISM/O. November 10, 2016.

[xii] "Broadway and Elm." URB/AN/ISM/O. November 10, 2016.

[xiii] “University pursues Plan to Invest in Broadway,” Yale Daily News. Sept. 28 1992.

[xiv] “On Broadway: A New Haven Streetscape.” Film. Produced by Elihu Rubin and Eleanor Oxman. New Haven: Yale University Digital Media Center for the Arts, 2000.

[xv] Branch, Mark Alden. "Then ... and Now." Yale Alumni Magazine. May & June 2009.

[xvi] “On Broadway: A New Haven Streetscape.” Film. Produced by Elihu Rubin and Eleanor Oxman. New Haven: Yale University Digital Media Center for the Arts, 2000.

[xvii] Lee-Murphy, Michael. "Broadway, New Haven: Remade, rebuilt, re-ruined." Uneven Earth. May 25, 2015.

[xviii] Charles, Eleanor. "In the Region/Connecticut; Yale Works to Break Down the Town-Gown Barrier." The New York Times. September 25, 1994.