For a quarter of a century, New Star Fish Market has been selling seafood out of a small stall inside the Essex Street Market.
But in about a month, it will be moving to a new location, inside the market's shiny, new home, right across the street.
"The feelings of moving are bitter-sweet," said Eric Suh, owner of New Star Fish Market. "We've built our business here and we've made a great life here, but at the same time we're excited about the move and the possibilities of still serving the community in a newer building.
That building is part of the massive Essex Crossing development, which has been rising over the Lower East Side for the last four years.
The new market space is three times the size of the current one and decidedly sleeker.
When it opens there will be 39 stalls and two restaurants. Nearly all of the market's current tenants will move to the new space and pay the same rent.
There will also be more than a dozen new tenants, including Rhonda Kave, who once had a stall in the market before opening a stand-alone store just a few blocks away.
"Our current spot is on a residential street," said Kave, owner of Roni-Sue's Chocolates. "Although we have a good deal on the square footage, it doesn't get any good foot traffic, so we're excited to be able to present ourselves and our products in a more trafficked location where people can enjoy and we can interact with our customers."
The Essex Street Market has been a neighborhood staple for decades, providing space for small, local vendors to sell their food products.
It opened in 1940 as part of Mayor Fiorello La Guardia's effort to get pushcarts off the street and into a more sanitary environment.
"The Essex Market moving over to the Essex Crossing is part of a broad effort that we're doing to revitalize all public retail markets," said Matthew Kwatinetz, an Executive Vice President at NYCEDC, which operates the market and paid for the build-out of the new space.
The new Essex Market is just one part of the food experience at Essex Crossing. In late spring, something called the Market Line is expected to open just below the Essex Market. It will house restaurants and a beer hall - all aimed at attracting a constant stream of customers.