The Story
In October 1991, Angel Moreno — a Spanish expatriate, nutrition scholar, and musician — opened the doors of a small restaurant at 405 E 6th Street. He called it Caravan of Dreams.
It was the first organic vegan restaurant in the East Village — a neighborhood that had already given the world the Beat poets, punk rock, and the Nuyorican literary movement. Moreno wasn't just opening a restaurant. He was building a space where health, music, art, and community could sit at the same table.
Within its first year, Caravan went fully plant-based. The kitchen served Mediterranean-inspired dishes made from organic ingredients. The dining room hosted live music almost every night. The walls displayed local art. Health seminars and yoga classes filled the quieter hours.
For over three decades, Caravan of Dreams has been a steady presence in a neighborhood defined by change. While the East Village transformed around it, this corner kept doing what it always did — nourishing bodies and ideas in equal measure.
The East Village tradition
The East Village has always been where New York's next ideas germinate. From Allen Ginsberg's poetry to CBGB's stage to the community gardens that turned abandoned lots into gathering spaces — this neighborhood believes in the radical act of making something together.
Caravan of Dreams carries that tradition forward. A place where a better world isn't just imagined — it's being built, one gathering at a time.
A new chapter
Today, Caravan of Dreams is more than a restaurant. It's a free space for gathering, building, and dreaming. We invite thought leaders, changemakers, hackers, artists, and anyone with a vision worth sharing to use this space — for the simple cost of eating and drinking here.
Because we believe that the most important conversations happen over shared meals. And that another world isn't just possible — it's already being built, right here on 6th Street.