Crown Heights, NY – On Friday afternoons, the headquarters of the Chabad sect of Orthodox Judaism comes alive as men in black jackets and hats stream like worker bees in and out of the subterranean entrance on Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn. Those exiting scatter across Crown Heights to prepare for the Sabbath — Shabbos in Yiddish — many drawn a block east by the overpowering smell of lilies and the ebullient welcome of Chani Frankel to Mimulo, a flower shop on Albany Avenue.
Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
“Shalom, rabbi! How are you?” she asked one customer on a recent Friday, greeting others with a “Happy Shabbos!”
Mrs. Frankel, clad in an aquamarine head scarf and a denim dress, skipped around the counter at the back of the sun-drenched, 900-square-foot store, but altered her stride to reverently approach an imposing, middle-aged rabbi to go over flower options for that week.
“They say that on Valentine’s Day flower shops pull in a crazy amount of money,” she said after the rabbi left. “But we have Valentine’s every Shabbat.”
Mrs. Frankel and her business partner, Freidel Levin, both 26, had been up priming the walls until 1 that morning. The shop, which opened three years ago, was in the midst of one of its regular makeovers. A teal antique couch was standing on its head, undergoing repair by Mrs. Frankel’s father; the women had installed it for nursing mothers, knowing, with five children between them, how difficult feeding in public in Crown Heights can be. A hutch, from which they usually serve tea and coffee, was pushed up against a far wall. But no customers seemed to notice.
Some of the young men, dressed in jeans and North Face jackets, and tapping away on smartphones, would have looked at home in any Brooklyn neighborhood if not for their neat beards and tzitzit — ritual prayer tassels — spilling over their pants. The young women were dressed conservatively to conform to laws of tznius, or modesty, and carried it off with aplomb — a figure-hugging sweater here, a pair of knee-length boots there, hinting at what some in the community call “tznius sexy.”
The stylishly short hairdo was a sheitel. Just sayin’.
A figure ‘hugging’ sweater is not tznius!
Al aileh ani bochiah…
>>>
The young women were dressed conservatively to conform to laws of tznius, or modesty, and carried it off with aplomb — a figure-hugging sweater here, a pair of knee-length boots there, hinting at what some in the community call “tznius sexy.”
If you go in a couple hours before shabbat and say you want to spend 25-30$ they will give you a few leftover 3/4 dead flowers put it in their fancy wrapper paper and charge you $30 with no shame, I have seen this happen many times.
a figure-hugging sweater here, a pair of knee-length boots there, hinting at what some in the community call “tznius sexy.”
Well I don’t expect the NY Times to understand this but I sure do expect VIN to know there is no such thing as “tznius sexy! That is an classic oxymoron!
Am I old-fashioned in not understanding this new trend, or is there a source for buying flowers for shabbes? $25-30 would help a lot of people prepare for for shabbes, rather than being spent on compost.
people receiving public assistance a euphemism for WELFARE should be spending our hard earned money on food and life necessities.I work an B”H make a nice living and $10 is my usual limit.
So… the NYT does a lovely “fluff piece” on a local florist where men go to buy flowers for their wives on erev Shabbos. Seems like a nice story.
NOPE! I’m going to side with “Mark Levin” on this one. It is clear proof of the marxist, socialist, philosophy that Obama has secretly been planting in the NYT Lifestyle section for decades (look for the cheesecake recipes… you will clearly see how they pander to the CAIR agenda!) The owner of that flower shop is clearly a secret Muslim who supports terrorism and apologizes for everything America has ever done. It is very clear as well that Bigfoot, Spiderman and the Bogeyman have all influenced this story.
Sarcasm 100% intended. 🙂
Thank you to the editors of the NYT for a nice story out of a frum community… even if they took a bit of artistic license.
let him spend what he wants. it’s for shulem bayees. i bought a new summer home in regency estates for my wife. does that make me ostanteoutes?