Posted to Crown Heights News on

Welcome to Crown Heights, the Hasidic SoHo

NY Daily News

Chani Frankel, co-owner of Mimulo Flowers in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.

Crown Heights is becoming the Hasidic SoHo. The neighborhood now has a spanking-new gallery of Jewish art with $175,000 paintings; a female rock band whose members are frum (religiously observant); and a kosher pizzeria that’s a hangout for chic moms with Louis Vuitton handbags.

“There’s been a renaissance in Crown Heights,” said Dovy Andrusier, 44, who chose to locate Betzalel Gallery in his home nabe. “This is my SoHo.”

The nabe, ripped apart by racial strife between African-Americans and Jews 20 years ago, is now a place where Hasidic business owners say they feel safe to go SoHo upscale – featuring Dean & Deluca-style produce at Mr. Greens on Albany Ave. to contemporary masters of Judiac art at Betzalel.

Andrusier thinks his Empire Blvd. gallery which opened last month, will find a ready audience in Crown Heights: “There are a lot of young professionals with nice houses; they have to decorate their walls.”

Betzalel’s co-owner, Shmuel Pultman, 45, previously ran a gallery in Borough Park.

“I have more people coming here to soak in the art in a single day than I would in a week in Borough Park,” Pultman said.

A young florist, Chani Frankel, uses her Albany Ave. shop to stage after-hours concerts and fashion shows.

“I feel like we’re starting to really embrace creativity and art a lot more,” said Frankel, 28, who lives in Prospect Heights but returned to the neighborhood where she grew up to open her store, Mimulo.

“Religious people buy a lot of flowers — and Crown Heights religious people want artistic flowers,” she said.

At a March concert at Mimulo, the nabe’s all-female Hasidic rock band, Bullet Proof Stockings, drew a crowd of 60.

The group’s drummer, Dalia Shusterman, 38, moved to Crown Heights from Los Angeles after her husband died a year ago. She said Crown Heights has welcomed her as an artist and a widowed mother of four.

At the storefront next to Mimulo, Benzion Raskin, 70, turned his wholesale warehouse into an all-kosher foodie mecca. Benz’s upscale fare includes smoked sable, French goat cheese and $21.99 bottles of white truffle oil.

“To bring in the young couples who would shop in Park Slope, I had to go gourmet,” he said.

Young moms like Ruth Weingarten, 24, and her friend Estee Gottlieb, 22, say there is one thing missing from their nabe that Soho has: Big-name fashion chains like Bloomingdale’s, Zara and H&M. But they’re happy with their neighborhood noshing spot, Basil — the Kingston Ave. kosher pizzeria that’s a mommy magnet.

Basil has done so well that owner Daniel Branover is planning to open a second restaurant — and hired a former SoHo chef to helm it.

“People have tried to get me to open restaurants on the Upper West Side and Williamsburg; I’ve been courted by investors in SoHo,” said Branover, 48. “It’s happening for us in Crown Heights — why would we go anywhere else?”

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55 Comments

  • the real crown heights

    I hope they can write a article about the real crown heights, the kindness and chassidishkeit and the ahavas yisroel that goes around.

  • Bshr

    with a picture like that, it puts a whole new spin on what parts of Crown Heights is……..

  • old timer

    This is the modern version of the famous streets of mud in Lubavitch…
    oichet mir a chabadlite chossid…

    why all the emphasis on Chitzonius?

  • whaaaat

    this article is PRETTY shocking. is that what we want? to be a “COOL” or “HIP” place? we are chassidim of the Rebbe, not striving to be a bunch of hipsters who they are all that! this stuff is major gashmius

  • CH resident

    This is a small part of crown heights and does not speak for most of the CH community

  • SOHO IN MORE THAN ONE WAY

    Indeed, Crown Heights is every day looking more like Manhattan, with married ans single women not dressed al pi halacha, men dressed like college students, and a culture that embraces gashmius as if there is no tomorrow. H’ yishmerenu!

  • yossi

    I sell Louis Vuitton on eBay, and not he fake stuff that people parade with around here.

  • chilul hashem

    enough of hanging our dirty laundry for the world too see. even if the world thinks its not dirty, it is by our standards.

  • Dr. Holmes

    Crown Heights is a nice community with a lot to offer for everybody. We have gourmet shops here, dance studios, music lessons and studios, and also great shiurim going on all over the place. Not to mention, a variety of shuls for all people to feel comfortable in. Granted the community was different before Gimel Tamuz, but since then it has at least doubled in size! I like living here, and it’s not really appropriate to compare how crown heights was 20 years ago until today. 20 years ago there want even such thing as a cell phone!

  • I love it

    Only problem is they didn’t mention Chevras Ahavas Yisroel to get everybody even more outraged.
    LMAO

  • cws

    so some people found a way to bend their need to feel out the “outside world” right here in the rebbe’s shechuneh. I hear from some baalei teshuva that this is what they wanted to leave the outside world for. How confusing.
    Why don’t people that do this, go to the Ohel and tell the Rebbe that they want to change the venue. Maybe the Rebbe should have some input here, all considering that this is what we’re here for?
    I think in all honesty that being up to date is fine, but once you change halacha, its a social sickness….wanting to change a community to justify your own challenges and issues.
    this is really odd.

  • ??

    ok, go gourmet and upscale for business…..but when you do it with the message that its ok to reduce HALACHAH and the Rebbe’s inyonim?

  • -Hasidic Soho-?

    Just because some parts of Crown Heights have a ‘Hasidic’ history in it is no justification for calling it the ‘Hasidic Soho’. the ‘Soho’ part has nothing to do with the ‘Hasidic’ aspect unless you can find the ‘Hassidus’ in any type of rock band, Louis Vuitton bags and trendy Pizza places.. I don’t have a problem with any of those, but calling them ‘Hasidic’ is a misnomer.

  • REAL OLD CROWNHEIIGHTZER

    I AM NOT LYING ,I MOVED OUT OF CH THREE YEARS AGO, AND I WAS A BIT SAD AT FIRST BUT BH I AM SO HAPPY NOW TO SEE OTHER COMMUNITIES AND CANT BELIEVE HOW I AND MY FAMILY LASTED THERE SO LONG.
    OUR REBBE WOULD SCREAM AND SHOUT IF HE CAME BACK NOW TO SEE THIS.

    I LOVE MOVIES AND GASHMIUS AND I WOULD BE CALLED A CH LIGHT, BUT EVEN I KNOW WHERE THE TRUTH IS , AND THAT IS WHAT THE REBBE WANTED AND TAUGHT US..
    I KNOW EXACTLY HOW CH WILL LOOK IN 15 YEARS AND IM SO GLAD IM NOT THERE TO WATCH IT UNFOLD….

  • Truth in Journalism.. please

    ‘Nabe, ripped apart by racial strife between African Americans and Jews twenty years ago’.. This statement implies a parallel between the actions of the Jews and the ‘African Americans’. It implies that the killers and assualters were equally Jews as none Jews. In true anti semitic style, this article conveniently forgets the horrific murders and assaults that took place in order to sound diplomatic at the expense of truth, justice, and the value of human lives.

  • DK1985

    I really don’t see why this is so terrible. If these people genuinely like these sorts of things, then let them enjoy! They’re not posers or trying to impress if they themselves enjoy it. They aren’t harming anyone, and there is a way to do all this al pi halacha. Take for instance the Bullet Proof Stockings- its all women, and they only to perform for women. Its not like they’re having mixed scandalous parties all over crown heights. And theres nothing wrong with enjoying some authentic italian cuisine at Basil- I think that this is good, to be more intergrated with the people around us instead of looking at it as if its traif. And art- what can possibly be wrong with modeling a nice gallery? Relax people!

  • To #25 YOGA

    There are already 2 Yoga classes in Crown Heights. One has been around for about 10 years where most of the students are chassidishe bubbies!

  • branover

    its all your fault!

    i do not eat in basil, on principle. i try make everyone i know share my ideals.

  • moving out fast

    This is the reason I am moving. Really!!! What happened to Crown Heights? People were afraid to walk the streets dressed untzniys. Now the length of skirts are getting shorter & shorter with no covering on the legs not even socks. Socks were considered very modern. have times changed or are we just acting greek?
    I want the Rebbe to be proud of me and my family.This article makes me want to run out fast.

  • esther

    this article is from the daily news. it was written by a non jew, let’s remember that and have a little perspective when we read it. it is a representation of crown heights as seen by a goya, simply. abviously what will strike her will be the similarities to her own world. let’s not judge crown heights and those like the betzalel gallery who have successfuly mixed elegance and chassidishkeit. i have visited the gallery and i’m puzzled as where did the writer see a similarity with soho!!

  • to 35

    the problem is what others see when they come into c.h. We have to judge c.h. because that is the real problem nobody does!!!! I am not judging the stores or bussiness owners just people. People who control how others see them. Yes there are people who still are very frum in all ways, but the growing crowd is not tznius.

  • where can I move to?

    To those who have taken the wise path of getting out of this neighborhood that’s on a steep downhill slope – please give me some good ideas of places to move to that are affordable and positive environments for raising children and teenagers. I would really appreciate your input.

  • Chill people

    I am an old timer. I remember the bad days when you couldn’t buy milk after 6PM and not much of anything else anytime. What’s wrong with having a nice neighborhood where you can get goodies instead of having to leave all the time? It sure beats being known as the neighborhood of the riots.

  • Mendel

    To #37: if you want an affordable living, with positive environment and excellent yeshivos – Baltimore is the place to be. Otherwise its Monsey – still more affordable than CH.

  • I love it

    37:
    Move to Williamsburg and begin a hateful version of Chabad which will fit right in with Satmar and your prejudiced backwards ways. Oh, and take the other so called Lubav/Snags with you.

  • Be proud

    The rebbe was very trendy in his day and we can be proud that we are not square and boring like some othe frum sects who judge frumkeit by all being the exact same. There is nothing wrong with artsy, which has NOTHING to do with tznius. This article is beautiful, shows we have a beautiful cultured community who retains their beautiful chassidish values and and elevates their physical surroundings to spirituality which is the purpose we are here on this earth! Get a grip, you all sound so narrow minded and unintelligent.

  • to #42

    Straight talk from the Yetzer Harah.
    So we should engage in this kind of gashmius in order to “elevate it to spirituality”
    LOL.

  • to #40 from #37

    Did you even read my question properly? Who is the hateful one here? I have no hate – I love my fellow jews equally. Sadly, I am seeing what is happening to the neighborhood – tznius is out the window (no longer just a small percentage of rebels and no longer just pushing boundaries), teenagers are having premarital underage physical relationships, eating treif….. need I go on??? These are FACTS. There is nothing prejudiced, hateful or backward about not wishing to raise children in an environment where this is prevalent and where parents either don’t care or no longer have control. Halacha doesn’t change with the times. This is not a community the Rebbe would be proud of.

  • I love it

    The Rebbe didn’t walk around Berlin and Paris dressed like Mrs Korf!

  • Ilana S.

    Wait, can someone make perfectly clear for me the relationship between art and Chassidus? I’m unclear. I wasn’t aware until the comments section of this website that they had an antagonistic relationship.

  • LA MORAH

    please don’t justify your own taivos,failings etc by attaching such terms to the rebbe.

  • TO #45

    What kind of CHUTZPAH to write like that about Mrs. Korf! You need to publicly ask mechilah of her on this website. Probably you are one of the people to whom she gave mussar about lack of tznius!

  • Yoysafe

    Let’s face it, people are frying out. “When the cat is away, mice will play”.
    Right now we’re on our own, so to speak. Right now we can prove that we really do believe or that we seriously lack sechel and emuna. The proof is in the pudding, as they say. Gashmiyus doesn’t have to detract from avoida but there’s no need to ape goyshkeit to come off hip or “with it”.

  • GET OUT

    AND I SAY TO THE “LITES:, GET OUT OF CH AND OUR SCHOOLS.
    GO TO PARK SLOPE OR LONG ISLAND

  • yitzchok c Jerusalem

    to 51 FYI you don’t own the neighborhood. Its your own fault for staying in golus. You are the ones addicted to gashmiyus or you would have made aliyah long ago. So have some guts and move to israel or SHUT UP! Same goes for all you haters you are not on shlichus whats your excuse for staying willingly in golus? You like holding up the geulah? Are you waiting for an atomic bomb to fall on NY?

  • Am Yisroel Chai

    the Bais Hamikdos was not destroyed because someone opened up a hip flower shop or started a cool band (Ladies, Bulletproof Stockings are incredible btw). The Rebbe wants us to increase in goodness & kindness so get off the high horse and make a yid smile.

  • yitzchok c Jerusalem

    You haters (non haters) all want to stay in golus. You are just like the jews in mitzraim who didnt want to leave and the jews of bavel a few generations later. You are just too comfortable to leave golus. Maybe learn a lesson from them look what happened to the Jews in mitzrayim and bavel (they both didnt merit to leave) Praying that you all wake up before its too late. All this needless suffering in golus because you are choosing once again to reject G-d’s land. Yeah you will think up a million excuses not to come (parnassah, children, family) All lies you tell yourself cause you are just too damn comfortable in golus among your gashmiyus trappings.

  • A Yid-s gashmiyus IS his ruchnius

    What is everyone so upset about? What do art and music have to do with the degradation of Crown Heights? Haven’t you as chassidim learned that a Yid’s gashmius IS his ruchinus? Not only is there nothing wrong with beautifying this world, as chassidim IT’S OUR JOB!!!