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Below are some of our favorite stores in the Rochester area. More than places to buy things, they are entertaining in themselves, like little museums. If you like to shop at locally-owned and one-of-a-kind stores like these, good places to find more of them are Park Avenue west of Culver (map) and Monroe Avenue between Goodman and Canterbury. (map) Abbott’s Ice Cream in Bushnell’s Basin is right on the Erie Canal. You can watch the fish and ducks soliciting food from the historic waters while you nibble your ice cream. It is located just west of Marsh Road on Route 96. Map Anderson Alley Artists Second Saturday open studio is great fun. More than two dozen artists open their studios to the public on the second Saturday of each month (except during summer) from 10 to 3. They are located in the upper floors of the Fabrics and Findings building at 250 North Goodman. Map While you are there, visit the adjacent Village Gate complex (see below). Animas Traders, 975 South Clinton, behind the Cinema Theater, is tightly packed with a fascinating collection of Latin American arts and crafts. Map While you are in the neighborhood, the India House Store (see below) and its two affiliated India House restaurants, one of them vegetarian, are only a few steps away. Barnes & Nobles in Rochester is the second largest bookstore in New York state. OK, so it’s not locally owned, but it is still wonderful, with huge open spaces, lots of easy chairs, and the obligatory coffee shop. It is located in the Pittsford Plaza at 3349 Monroe Ave in Pittsford, across from the flagship Wegmans grocery store. Map There are also several excellent local bookstores organized into the Rochester Area Booksellers Association. Beers of the World has an impressive selection of beers, some of them way out of the mainstream. You can find it at 3450 Winton Place, just off Winton Avenue. Map Craft Company No 6, at 785 University, has an interesting collection of high-end arts and crafts, jewelry, home decorations, etc. This is a great place for gifts if you are willing to spend a bit of money, but it is fun simply to tour. This store is much bigger than it looks from the outside. Map Elizabeth Gallery, 565 Blossom Road, is a wild art gallery with some 5000 pieces of art for sale. The building itself is half the fun: you thread your way upstairs and downstairs through a vast ex-industrial building, passing several art studios and a huge and wacky collection of art. You might have to hunt around a bit to find the entrance, but that’s part of the experience. There is an admission fee. Map Genesee Market, 900 Jefferson Road, west of the I-390 Jefferson Road exit, looks like a warehouse district, but actually it has several acres of retail stores. Map You may have to explore this place a bit to find the one you are looking for, but that’s part of the fun. These stores are especially recommended:
The Great Win Chinese Bakery at 1971 East Ridge Road claims to be the only Chinese bakery in upstate New York. Their pastries aren't as sweet as European-style pastries, so you have to adjust your taste a little, but exploring the selection of goodies there is still a lot of fun. Map Historic House Parts, 540 South Ave. The owners scout for old houses that are scheduled for demolition and scavenge any high-quality parts they can. It’s like visiting your grandparents’ attic, except on a much larger scale. Map House of Guitars, 645 Titus in Irondequoit, is known primarily for its gigantic selection of guitars and its attitude (it is affectionately known as H.O.G.), but it also has an intriguingly disorganized collection of tapes and CDs. Map India House Store, 999 South Clinton, is part of a complex of three India House establishments in the immediate area: a vegetarian restaurant, a non-vegetarian restaurant and the store itself, which advertises “a wide variety of teas, spices, herbs and specialty groceries, as well as books, music, movies and plenty of gift items.” This store is a few steps from Animas Traders (see above). Map Parkleigh, 215 Park Ave at Goodman, is a gift shop that’s definitely a cut above, with a huge assortment of chocolates, greeting cards, etc, and occasional live jazz. Part of the Park Ave scene. Map Paley Studios, 25 North Washington Street, downtown, is home to one of Rochester’s premier artists. A good selection of his work is always on display in the store-front windows. Map Paley works mainly with steel, and he thinks big (“The Sentinal”weighs 110 tons), but somehow his pieces often have a silky, flowing feel. Photos of his work are available at his web site. Ridge Road Station is primarily a model train store, and a fantastic one at that, but it also has a large selection of toys and Christmas merchandise. It is located at 16131 West Ridge Road, Holley, NY, west of Rochester, a few miles past Brockport. If you are traveling west on Ridge Road (Route 104), keep an eye out for the turnoff to Holley to the left; keep going straight on 104 and the store will be a little farther on the left. Map The Rochester Museum and Science Center gift shop is a great place to buy educational gifts for kids. While you are there, explore the back of the building to see and smell the herb garden, and to check out the neat “whisper” parabolas: if you stand at one of the parabolas, you can whisper a message that will be clearly heard by someone standing several yards away at the other parabola. There is no charge for visiting either the museum store or the gardens in back. Map Rochester Public Market, just northeast of downtown. With some 300 stalls and with up to 35,000 customers per day, this market can get to be very busy indeed. Map Schoen Place has a grouping of interesting shops on the north bank of the canal in downtown Pittsford. Don’t overlook the ones tucked away behind Abbott’s ice cream parlor. Map Spot Coffee is downtown at 200 East Ave. Perhaps you won’t mind paying the usual small fortune for a cup of coffee when you see just how much effort they put into this spectacular coffee shop. Map If you prefer intimate over cavernous, try Java’s instead. It is nearby at 16 Gibbs St, next to the Eastman Theater. Map Stever’s Candies, 623 Park Ave, has converted a house in the heart of the hip Park Ave area into a neat candy store where you can watch the chocolates being made. Map The Toy Soldier, 16 West Church St. in Fairport, specializes in children's toys that most chain stores don’t carry. It has an activity room where kids can test out toys and also a reading room. Map Village Gate, 274 North Goodman, just east of downtown, is a funky urban “mall” in a old print works that doesn’t have a single store found in any other mall in the country. Here is a challenge: try to walk down every corridor in this place without getting lost. It's bigger than it looks! Map Several of the shops here have their own web sites:
Wegmans food store, 3195 Monroe Ave in Pittsford. It’s true, people here really are corny enough to try to impress out-of-town visitors by showing them a grocery store. And you know what? It works. The left half of the store as you enter is the more interesting part. Map Wizard of Clay, southeast of Rochester at 7852 Route 20A in Bloomfield. Beneath a group of geodesic domes in the Bristol Hills is an impressive pottery operation that you can tour. There is also a retail store and a nature walk. Map | ||||