Third Passaic Street Classic Brought Customers to the Block

The third Passaic Street Classic brought vendors, music, and fun to the block over the weekend. Trenton residents were grooving through the streets, enjoying hip hop, classic cars, jazz, comedy, live art, and a paper boat race.

The event was hosted by the Passaic Street Business Association in partnership with Isles.

“It’s an event that we organized with local business owners to include a little foot traffic on one of the streets here in Trenton and to give an opportunity for everyone to come out and have a good time, especially after COVID,” Gulu Brewer, community and resident engagement coordinator at Isles, said.

The event lets residents take over Passaic Street and allow their kids to play with chalk, talk with owners of classic cars, and explore the different businesses in the area.

“That’s important because in any city, you might have people who are living or working right next to each other, and they never really get an opportunity to engage with each other and kind of get to know each other and have another face on the street that they get to wave hello to,” Brewer said.

See article below to learn more about the Second Passaic Street Classic.

Celebrate One of Trenton’s Most Resilient Commercial Strips

One of the local businesses in the spotlight was Razorsharp Barbershop. The owner and barber, William Hackett, has been cutting hair in that location for 18 years. “All praise to God, it was my calling, it is my passion, and you know, I was blessed enough to be able to build it,” Hackett explained. Well, he talked; he continued to cut hair Trenton resident’s hair. At that moment, he was cutting Trenton Resident Delorfette Clark’s hair.

Hackett said he enjoyed working with community organizations like Isles to bring the strip to life. “It’s an absolute blessing to the community. It brings love to the community…it’s a blessing.”

Clark has been coming to Hackett over the years. It is his second barber throughout his life. “Well, first of all, it’s just a personal connection, and he’s my cousin. So I know him personally. So it’s a trust relationship. But one thing about this particular barbershop is he’s really about the community,” Clark said. “They believe in giving back. I know that every year they sponsor The Back to School haircuts and stuff like that.”

The adults talked and danced, and the kids could play in a bouncy house and create origami boats. Nyzaiah Thomas was with his daughter and his son enjoying the bouncy house. “It gives back to the kids, the innocent kids that have nothing to do with what Trenton has going on. So I feel like it is a positive thing…I love it. I love it; it feels good,” Thomas said.

Thomas’ three-year-old son, Hassan Thomas, was excited to share his experience. “I made boats and jumped in the jumpy house with my sister and my cousin.”  He participated in the Greater Trenton Boat Race, where the community comes out and races paper boats in the D&R canal.

His sister, London Bostick, nine years old, was getting off the bouncy house to talk about the fun she was having. “We’re having a lot of fun on the jumpy houses and stuff, and we were like painting and stuff like that…How fun would I rate this? I would rate this from one to ten. I’ll say it’s 100,” Bostick said.

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