Downtown Story began with a simple realization: I missed downtown Manhattan.

After returning from an artist residency last year, I had not been downtown for more than a month. When I finally stepped off the ferry and walked those streets again, I felt an unexpected excitement. It felt like returning to a place I knew intimately. There is something about downtown that has always drawn me in. Its streets carry layers of history, while the skyline continues to reinvent itself. Glass towers rise above cobblestones. New buildings stand beside traces of New York’s past.

My connection to architecture began much earlier. As a child in Bucharest, my father introduced me to drawing through architecture. He had always dreamed of becoming an architect, and he taught me about proportion, perspective, and the geometry of buildings. Together, we looked at the city’s facades and streets, and what began as lessons in drawing gradually became lessons in observation. I learned that buildings are more than structures; they hold personal memories, collective histories, and the stories of the people who move through them.

Years later, after moving to New York, I turned to photography as a way of exploring the city. At first, I was drawn to architecture for its forms, rhythms, and geometry. Over time, my interest expanded beyond structure alone. I became interested in how places shape our sense of identity and belonging, especially in a city that is constantly changing.

These early photographs and studies eventually led to Downtown Story and later to the Broken series. What began as an exploration of architecture and geometry evolved into a broader reflection on memory, migration, change, and the experience of finding one’s place within an ever-evolving city.