FOR EMBROIDERED TABLECLOTHS

 “WHEN I NEED ANYTHING HERE IN NEW YORK, my first instinct is to buy from street vendors, who have been left out of pandemic relief,” says Elena Ketelsen González, assistant curator at MoMA PS1. She tends to make her way to Corona Plaza in Queens, an open-air commercial hub just off the 103rd Street 7-train stop, where, seven days a week, from early morning to late into the night, vendors sell fruits, food (tamales, elote), flowers, and home goods. “You can pick up everything from embroidered Mexican tablecloths to colorful aprons,” says González, who frequents vendor Don Vincente. (If you’re in the market for pottery, González says that, not too far away, she finds brightly colored hand-painted earthenware vases made by street vendor Gregoria Alvarez and her son.)