Welcome to the Neighborhood: North Shore of Staten Island

In the name of small scale adventure, I’m spending one day each month exploring an area in or around New York City that I’ve never been to before. Welcome to the neighborhood. 

When I decided on the neighborhood project for this year, I knew I had to make sure I hit every borough at least once. Staten Island is admittedly the borough I’ve spent the least time in. Or rather, the least extended time in. When I first moved to New York City and would regularly host friends and family (including often first timers), I mastered the long weekend tour. A day in midtown. The stroll through Central Park. Here are my museum suggestions.

But almost always, at some point, we’d end up on the Staten Island Ferry. Running every half hour, the Staten Island Ferry picks up at the southernmost tip of Manhattan and drops off at the northernmost point of Staten Island. The ferry is free and offers a decent view of the Statue of Liberty and an unmatched view of the lower Manhattan skyline. 

Typically, my tour guiding took loved ones on the ferry and then hustled them right back to Manhattan—the thrill of this not being going to Staten Island but rather going on a boat. Beyond those hosting duties, I’ve spent sparse time in the least populated borough. In April 2017, I went to Silver Lake Reservoir on a trip with Big Brothers, Big Sisters. Seven months later, I’d start the marathon from Staten Island, running across the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge into Brooklyn. And in 2019, my friends took me to a trampoline park on the island for my birthday. The internet tells me that that trampoline park is now closed. 

In all my years in New York, that fully summarizes my experience on Staten Island. I knew I’d have to phone a friend. Enter my friend Nicole. Nicole was born and raised in Queens. We met in Manhattan a decade ago and a few years ago she moved to Staten Island. When I told her I wanted to spend a day there, she was ready with the recommendations and the energy.

Morning of, I caught the ferry from my neighborhood in Queens down to lower Manhattan before catching the Staten Island Ferry over to the St. George Ferry Terminal. We had planned the day as a sort of nature/park day which makes sense given that Staten Island is referred to as “the borough of parks.” (It has the most parkland of all 5 boroughs.)

Our day revolved around Sailors’ Snug Harbor. Snug Harbor is an 83-acre park that mixes museums, nature, gardens, theatre, and education. When I say we only scratched the surface… you could easily spend weeks exploring everything the park has to offer. 

Snug Harbor was founded after the 1801 death of Robert Richard Randall, the heir to a shipping fortune. The goal was to create a retirement home and safe haven for older sailors. According to the parks website, “Over the next century, Sailors’ Snug Harbor expanded from its original three buildings to 50 structures and 900 residents from every corner of the world. By the turn of the 20th century, Sailors’ Snug Harbor was reputedly the richest charitable institution in the United States and a self-sustaining community with farms, a dairy, a bakery, workshops, a power plant, a chapel, a sanatorium, a hospital, a concert hall, dormitories, recreation areas, gardens, and a cemetery.” 

In the early 1950s, some of the historic buildings were demolished, including the church, hospital, and sanatorium. A combination of the Randall endowment beginning to run out and the new safety nets of Social Security and Medicare causing residency numbers to drop, the future of Snug Harbor looked uncertain. 

Then, in the 1960s, the five Greek Revival buildings and the chapel were saved by the newly formed New York City Landmarks Commission dedicating them as one of the city’s first landmark structures. These efforts were led by local Staten Islanders and their grassroots advocacy efforts to protect their park. Today, Snug Harbor holds the record for the highest concentration of landmarked structures in one spot in any of the boroughs. 

Today, Snug Harbor has 28 buildings, 14 botanical gardens, a 2-acre urban farm, and houses the Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art, the Staten Island Museum, the Staten Island Children’s Museum, the Noble Maritime Collection, Art Lab, Staten Island Conservatory of Music, and dozens of other small businesses. It remains a place “where history, architecture, gardens, agriculture, visual and performing arts, and education come together.” My friend and co-adventurer for the day is an artist who has frequently sold her art at various fairs and events at Snug Harbor. Check out her work!

You could truly spend hours wandering the park and taking in the beautiful nature but our main attraction that afternoon was a small group (9 people plus our guide) tour of the Chinese Scholar’s Garden. The tour lasted 90 minutes, cost $10, and was worth every minute and every penny. 

The Chinese Scholar’s Garden is based on the Ming Dynasty gardens (1368-1644) and all the architectural components of the garden (tiles, columns, beams, doors, bridges, windows, paving materials, etc.) came from Suzhou, China. Construction started on the garden in 1980 and it was opened in 1998. It is one of only two authentic, classical, outdoor Chinese Scholar’s Gardens in the United States. 

There are four key features that make it an authentic scholar’s garden—rocks, plants, water, and architecture. Our guide took us through a bamboo forest path, eight pavilions, various rock formations, and a central courtyard. To stay true to traditional Chinese construction, no nails or glue were used in the garden’s construction but rather the wooden elements are joined together through the mortise and tenon joint woodworking technique. 

Because the structures are wood, there are carpenter bees. “Oh, great, they’re back,” said our tour guide as I started sweating. “They don’t care about us so don’t worry.” As someone who is not allergic but embarrassingly and irrationally afraid of bees, this was little solace. Pleased to report I survived.

Scholar’s gardens, in general, were designed as a private retreat for meditation, study, and artistic pursuits. Being a scholar was a highly honorable position and to become one, you must have passed a two week test. There is a noticeable amount of peace one feels walking through the space listening to the gentle hum of water and breathing in the rich scent of winter jasmine. 

I loved learning about the three friends of winter. From a sign in the garden, “Symbolically, the most famous group of plants are the “Three Friends of Winter:” pine, bamboo, and the flowering plum… The flowering plum blooms in late winter and is therefore a symbol of the loyalty of a scholar’s friends even in the harshest of political times….the yellow grove bamboo is also a symbol of the scholar: flexible but strong. Because bamboo grows in segments, it is seen as a modest and humble plant, never growing unchecked….the last, the eastern white pine symbolizes loyalty during hard times… and also solitary strength as the scholar may often stand alone solely on his virtue. Finally, the pine is also a lucky symbol of longevity.” 

Other things I liked—the way the bridges and paths zigzag because Chinese philosophers believed zigzagging paths would throw off evil spirits, and, the mosaic on the upper pavillon that was made to symbolize harmony and unity between China and the United States. To represent China, they used broken pieces of rice bowls. To represent the United States, they used broken beer bottles. 

When the tour ended, we walked around Snug Harbor, enjoying a view of the wetlands and sitting on a quiet bench catching up. On our way out, a maybe 4-year-old child with his parents stopped us and asked if he could take a picture with his instant print camera. It was the sweetest interaction and felt like a really wholesome community moment as we asked him about his camera and how he likes taking photos. 

Of course all this walking makes one hungry so we left Snug Harbor and went across the street to Kills Boro Brewing Company, a craft brewery playing March Madness games and serving pizza from a giant pizza oven. The restaurant has big windows overlooking the water and if the science of brewing beer interests you, you can see the brewing equipment behind a big glass wall behind the bar. After pizza, we headed back to my friend’s apartment to visit a bit more before I began my trek back to Queens. 

Pending where you are based, getting to Staten Island can feel like a journey. But if you want a solid nature fix without leaving the boroughs, Snug Harbor offers all that and then some. To end on a hopeful note after a long winter, this being my third neighborhood of the year, it’s been fun to feel the shifts in weather. With spring officially upon us, I’m looking forward to more blooming and more mindfulness in nature and beyond—Snug Harbor was just the start.

Welcome to the Neighborhood:

• January: Ossining, New York [Blog & Video]

• February: Ridgewood, Queens [Blog & Video]