Since 2000, the folklorist Joseph Sciorra has built a presepio in his Brooklyn kitchen. His take on this traditional Italian Nativity scene reflects more modern settings like Baghdad or a Caribbean beach. This year, he set the crèche in the South Bronx of 1975

 For the past few weeks, Joseph Sciorra has been painstakingly putting together a tabletop tableau of the South Bronx circa 1975. Subway cars slathered with graffiti are set against bombed-out tenements and empty lots. An empty lot is covered with broken bricks and a battered mattress, and a charred car is abandoned by the curb. He added the final touch this week:

Jesus, Mary and Joseph

This is not an exclamation, but a partial roster

They are joined by the Three Kings, some stable creatures, shepherds and angels on high. Read more..

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Todd Heisler/The New York Times

CONVERGENCE Shoppers navigate the intersection of Southern Boulevard, Boston Road and 174th Street, a business hub in Crotona Park East. New construction has replaced blight in many parts of the neighborhood.

After being eviscerated by highway projects, poverty, public health crises and crime, this square-mile South Bronx neighborhood took its final blow in the form of arson, both by tenants and landlords, which helped to reduce rows of tenements to rubble.

The ruined streets conjured fear when used as film locations, whether for horror movies (“Wolfen”) or police dramas (“Fort Apache the Bronx”). They also served as a different type of media backdrop when, 31 years ago this month, President Jimmy Carter  paid a visit, describing the area as America’s “worst slum.”

In the intervening decades, much has changed. Once-desolate lots now have housing, whether rebuilt two-families or luxury condominiums.

One lot that Mr. Carter visited is now the site of Interval Green and Louis Nine House, a $46 million complex with 173 moderately priced apartments, built with planted roofs and leafy courtyards by the nonprofit Women Housing and Economic Development Corporation. It is to open to renters next month.

Some new homes in the area make use of materials that are sensitive to Crotona high asthma rates. In fact, 28 new brick-and-stone two- and three-families with nontoxic rugs and paints built by the Blue Sea Development Company, won a city environmental award in September.

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