The Children’s Magical Garden is located on the corner of Norfolk and Stanton Street on the Lower East Side. It is one block south of Houston, across from the Lower East Side Prep on one corner, and the Anna Silver School on the other.

The garden is open Monday through Friday after school, from 4 PM until dusk, and on Saturdays from 2 PM until dusk. We are also often open on Sundays and for extended times on weekdays. Come in whenever the gates are open! Contact us to become a member and open the garden whenever you have time!

The garden is open to everyone, and especially welcomes kids and their guardians.

Please check out our calendar of events for upcoming fun, kid and family oriented activities!

The garden is facing imminent destruction by developers. Please check out our Save the Garden page to find out what you can do to help!

 

History:

Since 1985, The Children’s Magical Garden has been an oasis for the neighborhood children and adults of Loisaida, located on the corner of Stanton and Norfolk Streets, adjacent to P.S. 20 and J.H.S. 25. What was once a garbage-filled lot crowded with drug users, infested with rodents and littered with crack vials and needles infected with HIV virus, there now stands a beautiful garden-playground. Here children of all nationalities play and enjoy themselves, away from the dangers of the streets, free of charge.

The making of this garden was a major effort of neighborhood children, Carmen Rubio, and myself. Not only did it take grueling work, but also risks. This corner was used by local drug dealers for the sale of their merchandise, who resisted leaving. Furthermore, the existence of a “crack house” on the first floor of the building next to the garden made it even more problematic, since it attracted all sorts of criminal elements. Even with the work in progress, there was violence and drug dealing in front of the children. People were being mugged and beaten on a daily basis inside and outside the building. Everyday we found needles and crack vials, which these individuals would throw into the lot, as we were removing the mountains of garbage, one bag at a time. .

This situation we faced for a long period of time. However, we prevailed, by organizing tenants against the crack house. We were successful in having them evicted in court.

But the real battle was fought on the front and side of the garden, where there was plenty of drug dealing, day and night. It took a lot of courage and determination on the part of several brave co-activists. With perseverance, we confronted them and let them know it was time to stop, for the sake of the kids and the garden. At times, some of them became violent and attacked us.

Nevertheless, all this never discouraged me, the other gardeners, or the kids, who were so excited to have a place to call their own. We kept up the good fight and in time the garden bloomed with all kinds of flowers.

Children from all over the community came to the garden and their parents and other neighbors contributed all sorts of toys, flowers, and even trees. The school next to the garden, P.S. 20, gave us brushes and paints and other materials to enable us to teach the children art. The principal of P.S. 20, Dr. Golubchic, deserves praise for not only enabling us to receive supplies, but also for helping us to remove the drug dealers.

Music became part of the project also. All sorts of musicians came at my invitation to teach the kids cultural music, such as African and Latin rhythms, and jazz. Every Friday during the summer, the garden became a joyful place for adults as well as children.

Soon enough, all sorts of people started to support the garden. The local police department told us they support the garden “one hundred percent”. Moreover, Newsday published an article on the garden, and it was aired on a segment on the Discovery Channel. The University Settlement recognized our garden and had a celebration event on April 25th, 1995, wherein the AmeriCorps participated. The Community Board and the Borough President’s Office also recognized the garden and took it off the auction list in order to save it for the community children. Local business people also gave us support by writing letters. Newsday reported the April 25th event.

Many positive things can be said and written about the Children’s Magical Garden. The main thing is that many children have benefited and are benefiting to this day, by playing, learning art and music, growing flowers, vegetables and trees, in a safe environment. The Association for the Help of Retarded Children (AHRC) benefited by sending to the garden groups of children during the summer, while I was a supervisor at the New York League Workshop, for two and a half years. Public School 20 and Junior High School 25 benefited by not having a dump across the street and by sending their children to the garden to grow flowers. The garden made the schools safer by greatly diminishing the criminal elements around the schools.

The garden is now well known for its free service to the community of the Lower East Side. Political entities support the project. Somehow, a private developer called 88 Holding Co. has managed to buy a part of the garden in order to erect a building.

In August of 1999, a group of workers sent by the 88 Holding Co., entered the garden after clipping the lock on the entrance, without my permission. They destroyed the children’s clubhouse, full of toys, cut down a twenty-five foot pine tree, and trampled on all kinds of medicinal herbs and flowers planted by the children. All this happened in front of the children, who protested, and were told to “shut up”.

Needless to say, the violated the garden and caused stress in the kids, in the community, in Carmen Rubio and myself, who have been part of the garden from its beginning. It was a mean-spirited action on the part of 88 Holding Co., but most of all, it was illegal and they are liable in a court of law. According to the City Council, 88 Holding Co. had purchased 50 feet by 23 feet of the former lot, or one third. The rest remained city-owned land which is under the protection of Community Board #3. The company went beyond its boundaries to destroy the clubhouse and the pine tree they cut down.

Furthermore, they never sent a surveyor, as required by law. This is clearly a blatant violation of the law. It shows the disregard and lack of respect 88 Holding Co. has for the zoning laws of this city. Clearly, they intended to take more of the land than they had purchased. The measurements speak for themselves.

Let me conclude by thanking all the people who took part in the making of the Children’s Magical Garden, including Dr. Golubchick, former principal of P.S. 20, and Gladys Torres, former head of the P.T. A., who gave me support from the start. There is a long list of people who through the years participated by working with the children, some now deceased.

I am grateful beyond words for all the help and support of Carmen Rubio, who has been the major supporter. Indeed, without her courage, endurance, and love for the children, the garden would have never been possible.

And finally, I thank the first children, who are now adults. Thanks to the children, there stood, and in part still stands, a garden of hope, a symbol of courage, an example of endurance and determination, by a community fed up with crime and the low quality of life. That endeavor shall never be in vain. Now a new generation of kids enjoy the garden. These kids don't have to worry as much about crack dealers, but there are still so many dangers in our streets, and so few safe places for kids to learn and to play. The children depend on the garden for their happiness and growth.