New York Times, June 17, 2018: A revival of black business, and pride, in Brooklyn
That is a question that Felicia Eve, the owner of the yarn shop, String Thing Studio in Park Slope, has confronted regularly. “It’s along the same lines of, ‘Oh, you live in Park Slope?’” Ms. Eve said. “Or, ‘Oh, you own a brownstone in Park Slope?’ Or, ‘Oh, you have three kids in private school?’”
On hand to hear Ms. Eve’s story were Cynthia Gordy Giwa and Glenn Alan, who run the website Black-Owned Brooklyn. They brought The New York Times along on a recent Saturday morning as they visited a handful of shops in Brooklyn.
Ms. Giwa, 36, of Bedford-Stuyvesant, had a career as a White House correspondent and political reporter for black-focused publications including Essence and The Root; she is now the marketing director for ProPublica. Mr. Alan, 30, of Crown Heights, is a regional operations manager for a popular fast-fashion chain. They run the blog in their free time, traveling through the borough on weekends to interview shop owners. Since its February debut, the site has risen quickly in popularity. A year-end goal of 1,000 Instagram followers was achieved in 22 days, and include the filmmaker Ava DuVernay and the comedian Wyatt Cenac.
