4 Philly Stretch Centers to Help You Loosen Up

Stretching out at Lumos Yoga & Barre / Photograph by Gabriela Barrantes

Stretching is a crucial, but often overlooked, part of our daily routines, whether we’re long-distance runners or simply always on the go. (So much so that we get ourselves into a bind and can’t work out the kinks on our own.) Throughout the region you’ll find franchises of StretchLab and Stretch Zone — both of which we love — but we also recommend turning to these local wellness studios for that sweet release from head to toe.

Massage Studio of Philadelphia

At her Old City boutique, founder and owner Laura Jenkins provides a two-in-one solution: part assisted stretching done on a large yoga mat, part bodywork on a table in the massage room. The sessions can be 60, 90, or 120 minutes. Jenkins says the stretch portion allows the practitioner to evaluate your range of motion and areas of tension before further releasing those areas with soft-tissue work. “A lot of our clients use this as part of their maintenance plan, while others use it for rehab purposes for acute or chronic pain management,” she says. From $140; 219 Cuthbert Street, #403, Old City.

The airy space at Massage Studio of Philadelphia / Photograph by Daniel Knoll

Lumos Yoga & Barre

Find a twice-weekly Community Stretch & Restore class at Lumos’s Green Street location. Taught in the barre room, the sessions are meant to alleviate stiffness in your body, using props like blocks, bolsters, straps, and bands for support and slower, gentle movements (no dynamic stretching here!) with longer holds. (Props give attendees different options so they can achieve stretches without having to strain or move in an uncomfortable way.) The hour-long classes take place on Mondays and Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m. $10; 2001 Green Street, Spring Garden.

A hamstring stretch / Photograph by Daniel Knoll

Svargá

Owner Klaudia Rzotkiewicz is certified in the functional training practice known as Greatest of All Time Actions (GOATA), which focuses on restoring and correcting movement patterns through biomechanics. “The exercises are designed to provide a stable foundation for your body to maintain vitality in the years to come,” she says. She also specializes in realigning your posture and pain management techniques via what she calls “ancient wellness with a modern twist.” Her bodywork session includes a phone consult to discuss your concerns and goals, a general range-of-motion assessment in her Roxborough studio with a full-body assisted stretch on a massage table, and trigger-point therapy to further relieve aching muscles and joints. Cupping, gua sha massage, and Pilates are also on offer. Bodywork sessions from $123; 7928 Ridge Avenue, #105, Roxborough.

Klaudia Rzotkiewicz of Svargá works on a patient. / Photograph by Louie Herman

Soul Healn Wellness Center

Think karaoke is just for nights out at the bar with your best pals? Think again. Soul Healn in Manayunk has a Stretch and Karaoke class that seeks to release tightness in your body through singing — along with muscle lengthening and relaxation exercises. It’s all part of owner Kishna Celce’s work to heal her clients holistically, through spiritual expansion as well as physical movement. (She opened the center three years ago to create a safe space for those recovering from emotional duress, trauma, and anxiety.) Not into singing? The Soul StretchN session uses trauma-informed stretches, such as reclined neck release and figure four, to soothe your body and mind as well as improve flexibility and circulation. Sessions from $45; 106 Gay Street, Suite 302, Manayunk.

Published as “Loosen Up” in the 2026 issue of Be Well Philly.

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Youth Sports in Philadelphia Are Uneven — and the Gaps Are Growing

Field at Vare Recreation Center / Photography by Gene Smirnov

It is a warm September evening at the sparkling new $21 million Vare Recreation Center at 26th and Moore streets, home to the Sigma Sharks youth sports program. Neighborhood children romp around a sprawling playground as a DJ spins oldies, while three different football teams practice in different corners of the center’s multipurpose football/ soccer field. As teams of various ages run plays, younger siblings — the next generation of Sharks — dart about.

Before the new gridiron opened in late July, the six Sigma Sharks teams practiced and played as they always had, on an unkempt grass field strewn with rocks and dotted with large dirt patches and the occasional pile of dog feces. “It was dirty, and looked like it wasn’t taken care of,” says Caleb Williams, a member of the Sharks U13 (under-13) team and an eighth-grader at Christopher Columbus Charter School.

Not anymore. The new Vare field is a pristine vivid green, surrounded by a four-foot-wide bright blue border. “We call it the water,” says Tariq “Coach T” Long, who directs the U8 squad. “Once you cross the water, you’re in with the Sharks.”

And that’s a pretty good place to be these days. The Sigma Sharks, who have been around since 1992, sponsor the football teams plus a cheerleading program and four basketball squads, serving more than 300 kids. Sharks president Anthony Meadows says they love the new facility, which also boasts two gleaming indoor basketball courts. “When the kids saw it for the first time, they lost their minds,” says Kevin Mathis, a coach since 1997. (He calls himself “the longest-tenured Shark.”)

Since Vare can’t accommodate all six teams at once, some still practice and play at Smith Playground at 24th and Jackson. Meadows calls it “adequate.” Tanisha Perry, who brings her eight-year-old twin sons from West Philly to play, disagrees. Smith is dirty, she says, and “attracts the wrong crowd.” Vare, on the other hand, is safe, with clean bathrooms and omnipresent staff members.

“I want to be here, always,” she says.

You can see why. In Philly, Vare is a unicorn of a facility that materialized through a combination of funding from the city’s soda tax and a relentless champion in the form of City Council President Kenyatta Johnson. Johnson worked with former Philadelphia Eagle Connor Barwin’s Make the World Better Foundation on the project, which is in his district.

Most city districts (and rec centers, and kids) aren’t quite this lucky. A 2023 study by Temple University, commissioned by Philadelphia Parks and Recreation and managed by the Philadelphia Youth Sports Collaborative (a nonprofit consortium of youth sports providers and advocates that provides resources, support, and funding), looked at more than 1,400 sports facilities managed by Parks and Rec. Sixty percent of them were rated below or far below average. Eighty percent of athletic fields the kids play on aren’t stand-alone fields, but the outfields of baseball diamonds. On top of that, the Temple study found, facilities in neighborhoods with a larger percentage of white residents were of a higher quality.

It’s very much a two-tiered system. There’s a big gap between them.” — Beth Devine, executive director of the Philadelphia Youth Sports Collaborative

Zoom out a little more, though, and you see that that depressing inequity pales in comparison to the big and growing gulf between the youth sports climate in the city and that in many suburbs, where the fields, facilities, and infrastructure are … well, an entirely different ballpark. “In the suburbs, it’s not even a second thought,” says Meadows. “Kids just go to the fields and throw the ball around. Even if it’s a grass field, it’s nice. In the city, you get overused grass and dirt. And the turf fields are often locked up.”

“It’s very much a two-tiered system,” says Beth Devine, executive director of the PYSC. “There’s a big gap between them.”

She’s right about this … and then some. By now, we all know that youth sports as a whole are only getting more professionalized and more expensive as time rolls on, and that money is a real — and quickly expanding — fault line in and barrier to the world of kids athletics. (A July New York Times story about this very topic cited an Aspen Institute finding that the average U.S. sports family spent $1,016 on its child’s primary sport in 2024 — a 46 percent hike since 2019.) And the stakes of access to athletics are even higher than you might think — and affect more people than just kids and their families. Studies indicate that kids who play sports are better at problem-solving and self-regulation, and, as the Temple report showed, violent crime rates drop in neighborhoods that have youth sports facilities. The better the condition a field or court is in, Devine says, the less crime there is around it — across all types of neighborhoods.

Currently, only 25 percent of kids from U.S. households with annual incomes below $25,000 participate in youth sports, compared to 44 percent of kids from families with annual incomes greater than $100,000 — which makes it tough for sports to be any kind of great equalizer. Add to that the billionaires and private equity firms trying to get a piece of America’s $40 billion youth sports business, founding commercialized camps and leagues and tournaments that compete with and pull talent from even the most moneyed, polished suburban rec teams. All of which means that the chasm between the typical city neighborhood rec team and everyone else is only growing.

The statistics — and what they portend — can be overwhelming. It doesn’t seem like that’s going to change anytime soon.

But then … there’s Vare. Not as fancy as some of the more elite facilities you can find in the ’burbs, with a program not as structured or rigorous or polished — but a game-changer for the kids who play there. “A facility in their neighborhood that kids can call home,” as Meadows says.

“I want this to be normal for everybody,” he adds.

Which makes you think: In a city that loves and understands the value of its sports as well as Philly does — a city that produced Dawn Staley, Wilt Chamberlain, Mo’ne Davis; a city with rec teams that are out there winning championships and tournaments; a city with five (soon six) professional teams — why can’t it be the norm for everybody? Or maybe the more apt question right now, as we stare down a year that’s going to bring the world to our stoop to watch the World Cup, a PGA championship, the Major League Baseball All-Star Game, and the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, is this: How might we make it so, before the opportunity gaps — for the kids, for our city — yawn into infinity?

•

For eight years, Amos Huron has led the Philadelphia Youth Organization, which was founded in 1990 and encompasses the Anderson Monarchs program and its soccer, baseball, softball, and basketball teams. He believes the baseball/softball field at the Marian Anderson Rec Center — which the Monarchs also use as a multi- purpose field — is “probably the best in the city.” He’s likely right: When you walk by the field at 18th and Fitzwater, it’s hard to miss the gleaming, pristine outfield, complete with a warning track and bright yellow foul poles. The 3.4-acre facility also boasts basketball courts inside and out, and room for boxing and martial arts. There’s even an indoor baseball training facility, thanks to an assist from former Phillies star Ryan Howard a decade ago.

It’s still not close to many of its suburban counterparts.

Some 20 miles away, the 725 kids of the Newtown-Edgmont Little League play on seven grass diamonds, three of which have lights. The 15-year-old, 10,000-square-foot indoor Flanigan Center, part of the complex, was recently renovated and allows for winter workouts for NELL players and high school teams from the city and suburbs. An army of volunteers, unpaid coaches, and parents help keep the place running, as do local business sponsors: Levels range from $500 a year (Field Level Sponsor) up to $1,500 (Elite Level Sponsor, which comes with a large sign in the Flanigan Center and two baseball field signs). Even the snack bar is top-tier. “Some people eat there versus the local pizza place,” says coach and former president Daren Grande.

Not far from the NELL baseball universe, the Radnor-Wayne Little League, which will turn 75 in 2027, operates “at least” 12 fields that it leases from Radnor Township and its school district and serves between 900 and 1,000 kids in its baseball and growing softball leagues, according to president Tom McWilliams. Worth noting is that registration fees aren’t much different from a lot of what you see with leagues in the city. Those vary, but seem to hang between $100 and $250; Radnor-Wayne’s fees sit between $150 and $195, and NELL’s is $200.

On paper, Philly has far more assets than either of these townships, with 259 different city locations encompassing more than 1,500 fields and courts. But with all the kids across the city who play on one team or another (some 40 to 45 percent of Philly youth participate in “some structured activity program,” says Philly Parks and Rec director of youth sports Mike Barsotti), it’s not enough to meet the demand. In fact, access is the first problem many leagues face: Competition from adult leagues, travel outfits, high school teams — St. Joe’s Prep’s football squad has practiced on the Philly Blackhawks Athletic Club field in North Philly; Universal Audenried Charter High School practices at Vare — and other neighborhood programs creates scheduling and permitting challenges. The city’s permit process favors neighborhood organizations, but if they don’t register in time, other groups get the chance to sign up (and they’re usually more organized and quicker to fill out requests, says Barsotti). And when new fields open, they reach capacity almost immediately. At the South Philadelphia Super Site turf football field at 10th and Bigler, games are scheduled to the minute during the season, says Adam Douberly, a father to three rec-league athletes. Kids get one hour, exactly, on the fields, playing times vary, and games can end as late as 10 p.m.

Even the popular 1,200-player Philadelphia Dragons Sports Association (formerly the Taney Youth Baseball Association, home to the team that played in the 2014 Little League World Series), which recent president John Maher says has “a relatively affluent demographic, mostly in Center City,” can’t find sufficient field space, and “100 percent” has facility envy when it faces suburban teams in District 19 Little League competition. (Right now the Dragons’ biggest challenge, he says, is finding fields for its burgeoning coed flag football program.)

All of this use (and overuse) helps lead to the second big issue: maintenance. “The city budget to maintain the fields is close to zero, so the fields may start off with grass, but at the end of the season, they are dirt pits,” says Liam Connolly, executive director of Safe-Hub Philadelphia, which provides soccer opportunities for kids ages four to 18 in the Kensington area.

Douberly’s boys play in the Dragons program, which plays at FDR Park and Markward Playground in Schuylkill River Park, among other spots. Markward, he says, “is completely overgrown. It’s like bouncing a baseball on a concrete floor.” Playing on fields of that caliber, especially for those who know there is something better out there, isn’t just harder. It’s dispiriting.

City fields in disrepair at Markward Playground

“The kids would go to other places and see all of [the nice facilities] when their field was dust and rocks,” Meadows says about the Sharks, pre–Vare glow-up.

Curt De Veaux, a Monarchs coach who also runs the City Athletics soccer program with his wife, Janea, is trying to introduce soccer to kids across Philly. He agrees that it’s hard to find places to play. And at Germantown’s Mallery Rec Center, where he directs City Athletics, “I’ve personally paid to get the grass cut and lines put on our field,” he says. (Barsotti, who notes that the department’s mowing contract is upwards of $3 million a year, says cuts are scheduled weekly during the seasons: “Some groups choose to mow more frequently to keep the grass the length they want and ensure it’s cut fresh for their games.”)

It’s not just the field and facility quality teams grapple with, either: A third issue is that the lack of infrastructure and financial resources within grassroots organizations means, across all kinds of teams, that there’s often not much room for strategic planning or coach training, or the ability to travel to seminars and conferences that provide information on new leadership techniques.

De Veaux would say that his goals for City Athletics are even more modest than that: He mostly wants to grow his reach across the city, to get more kids acquainted with the basics so they can grow into players who love the sport and can compete if they want. When it comes to competition, he knows what’s out there. As a longtime coach, he’s spent time in the past meeting with members of the suburban soccer powerhouse FC Delco — a regional force and travel league that plays a national schedule and includes many of the best players from the area — to learn more about how to run a high-end program.

FC Delco, which started in the 1980s in Delaware County, now has main hubs in Downingtown and Conshohocken with about 10 fields between them, plus more than 60 paid, certified coaches and some 1,700 boys and girls on 112 teams. Many of its players are from the suburbs, but some city kids make the trek, general manager Rob Elliot says. Money is another potential barrier for kids. Travel costs for the teams can run into the thousands each year, though the club does provide some financial aid and partners with the JT Dorsey Foundation, which offers soccer opportunities for kids in impoverished areas across Pennsylvania.

De Veaux, meanwhile, says his meager resources allow for only limited growth. And overall lack of infrastructure and resources in local and grassroots organizations just “widens that gap,” as he says, between those teams and the FC Delcos of the world. And the bigger that gap gets, the worry goes, the more kids and families are likely to opt out of city programs like his. Or just opt out of sports entirely.

•

At a time in the 1980s and 1990s when youth sports were on the rise, Philadelphia’s dire city budget shortfalls left no room for investment in recreational spaces, while in townships and neighborhoods outside the city, programs grew and thrived. Still today, many of the surrounding towns have real funding advantages, even as most leagues receive no money from the townships in which they’re based. They exist (and in some cases, excel) thanks to registration fees, donations, and sponsorships. Media Little League president Andrew Tamaccio says that league “has 100 local sponsors, if not more.” Marple Township Little League, with 360 kids, has a slew of sponsors too, and significant community support that helps keep the fields mowed, the lines chalked, and the snack bar stocked.

While it’s true that leagues in less moneyed townships face many of the same issues as their city counterparts, by and large, the differences between the suburbs and the city — between leagues with cash and those without — are real, and the gap is wide, the Sharks’ Meadows says. Though that doesn’t mean there isn’t real talent in the city rec leagues, and real successes. The Blackhawks in North Philly have won five national gridiron titles, the Sharks have won “several championships,” Meadows says, and the Frankford Chargers U8 football team captured a 2024 national title.

But competition is getting stiffer on and off the field.

As the July Times story detailed, the expense and expectations of youth sports are on a steady rise: expense in the form of ever more elite travel teams, gear, camps, and tournaments; expectations in the sense that parents increasingly are looking for returns on their (significant) investments in the form of college scholarships. Not exactly a sure bet, when you consider that the odds of a high school player even making a Division I hoops roster are 110:1, according to data from the NCAA. It’s 108:1 for soccer, 43:1 for baseball, and 33:1 for football.

Meanwhile, PYSC’s Devine frets, the abundance of travel teams and the overall shift we’re seeing toward ever more elite athletic experiences “has sucked the life out of youth and rec-league programs.”

It was in this sports climate and moment that board members of three different city soccer organizations — Fairmount, Philadelphia City FC (formerly Palumbo), and United Philly — decided to rally. In February of 2025, they voted to combine and form the Philadelphia International FC (known as Inter Philly) in hopes of replicating something like the FC Delco model.

“We want to provide people who live in the city with a competitive environment similar to what is available in the suburbs,” says Connor Robick, the group’s co- executive director. They currently work with nearly 4,000 kids (about 850 players on 53 travel squads, the rest in recreational play), ages two to 19, all over the city, from introductory training (which starts at $140 for an eight-week program) to highly competitive travel squads (which can run between $1,650 and $2,100). It has home fields at the Edgely Fields in Fairmount Park, Cristo Rey Philadelphia High School and the Salvation Army Kroc Center in North Philly, and the South Philly Super Site and Palumbo.

As with many of the suburban and travel teams, Inter Philly fundraises with and seeks sponsorships from local businesses to offer up to $300,000 annually in financial aid to its team members. Of course, Robick says, the organization is always looking to raise more cash and do more.

Other city programs and rec leagues have similar funding aims and challenges. “I beat the bushes to find money,” Meadows says of his efforts in South Philadelphia.

South Philly Sigma Sharks president Anthony Meadows

There’s also been a continuous push by Barsotti and other city parks officials, as well as community members, to increase rec center staff so that there are enough people to help with programs “from sports to arts to after-school,” Barsotti says. But it’s hard finding — and paying — enough qualified people. When suburban soccer clubs are paying U9 coaches $65 an hour, he says, it’s tough — nay, impossible — for the city to match it. It’s often up to the community to provide volunteers to make things run smoothly, another hard task.

You might be thinking now: What about the Philadelphia Beverage Tax, aka the soda tax? Wasn’t that supposed to help chip away at this very thing? Mayor Jim Kenney’s nine-year-old tax has actually brought in nearly $600 million in revenues. Nearly 40 percent of that money has gone — as planned — to fund operating expenses and the city’s also crucial preschool expansion, while money earmarked to revamp and renovate parks, libraries, and rec centers (the Rebuild initiative) doesn’t extend to the operations of those places.

Still, there has been progress in improving facilities and fields. Vare, for one example. As of press time, 39 sites have seen a revamp at some level — new turf fields at Murphy Recreation Center in South Philly, a freshly sodded football field at Chew Playground in Point Breeze, upgraded basketball courts at 8th and Diamond Playground in North Philly. Another 14 are under or preparing for construction right now.

It’s also worth noting that revenues from the tax have fallen short of the $92 million-per-year projection (the 2023 total was $72.7 million). Even so, this year, Barsotti says, youth sports did manage to get a bit of an unexpected windfall in the form of an extra $3 million in the budget for fiscal year 2025. The cash went into equipment (basketballs, soccer balls, portable scoreboards, volleyball poles), coach training through a program with PYSC, and grants for community sports organizations. It might be a small sign of better times to come; in the run-up to her election, Mayor Cherelle Parker said she’d like to at least double the Parks and Rec budget by the end of her first term (to help catch up from those budget shortfalls of the ’80s and ’90s). This would surely help get more playing spaces up to snuff, though the actual numbers still don’t inspire a huge amount of optimism when you compare them to those in other cities. Chicago’s 2025 budget included $598 million for parks and rec; New York’s was $582.9 million. Dallas’s 2026 budget has $118.4 million slated for the parks department, and in Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser’s most recent budget included $89 million just for an indoor training facility for boxers, runners, gymnasts, and even e-sports players. In Philly, the entire Parks and Rec budget is $83.4 million.

It seems clear, in other words, that if we want to level up on our youth sports, it’s going to take more than just what the city coffers have to offer. It’s time we all look elsewhere — lots of elsewheres — for creative solutions.

•

It was the night of the “Battle of the Beach” game — La Salle College High School versus Malvern Prep in Ocean City. Enon Eagles athletic director Greg K. Burris couldn’t make it to the Shore — he was running his own football practice in North Philly. But he streamed the game live, beaming the whole time. La Salle’s dramatic 42–35 victory was due in part to three Enon Eagles alumni who all scored touchdowns, as well as “a couple of guys on defense wreaking havoc.”

“I was sitting there with my chest puffed out,” Burris says.

The Eagles are a refreshing end run in the world of Philly youth sports, part of the 149-year-old Germantown-based Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church, which has more than 5,000 members at its two locations. The church’s athletic program is a little more than 20 years old — a model that ought to be studied, scaled, and replicated. The program includes baseball, basketball, football, soccer, track and field, cheerleading, martial arts, and tennis opportunities — all part of the “athletic ministry” at the church. Participating families (including non-Christians; the teams take all comers) aren’t obligated to attend services or be members, but there is Bible study offered after practices and games. “We are a church,” Burris says. “We don’t hide that.”

The 700-plus kids in the Eagles program play against other neighborhood programs, and Enon offers reasonable registration fees (they vary depending on the sport; in some cases there’s no fee), handles upkeep on the facilities they use — including a turf field — and mitigates equipment and travel costs through offerings and tithing from church members. Their programs run year-round and attract families from all over the city. Volunteer coaches direct the teams, and parents help out with day-to-day operations.

As the Eagles soar, there’s more hope — and more ideas — to be found, as the city does what it can, little by little. There’s Vare, of course, and other crucial rec center improvements in progress at Johnny Sample Recreation Center in Cobbs Creek Park, which will feature new indoor basketball courts and a pool. There’s also FDR Park, which will soon welcome a facilities bonanza, thanks to money from the city and state, grants from entities like the William Penn Foundation, and contributions from outside organizations like the Reinvestment Fund.

When, a few years back, the Fairmount Park Conservancy surveyed 3,000 South Philadelphians, they learned that more basketball courts ranked first on the collective wish list for FDR Park. Another priority was athletic fields. And so that’s what’s in the works (albeit the very slow works): 12 new multipurpose fields, a baseball/softball cloverleaf, and eight new courts. (Five multipurpose fields will debut in 2026, according to Conservancy chief operations and project officer Allison Schapker; they’ll be available via permits to teams and programs from all over the city.)

Inter Philly’s Robick is optimistic about what the FDR development means for kids sports. “It will be a crown jewel of the city,” he says. “It’s easy to get there. There will be cork pellets on the turf fields that are non-cancer-causing. And people can use it from 5 a.m. to 1 a.m. if they want to.”

Football at Vare

Another initiative worth getting excited about? The $36 million Alan Horwitz “Sixth Man” Center in Nicetown, home to the 10-year-old Philadelphia Youth Basketball enterprise. The place opened in the summer of 2024, the result of a $5 million gift from namesake Horwitz (founder of Campus Apartments and Sixers superfan) and then a multi-year campaign from the PYB that gathered a number of investors and contributors who bought commemorative bricks in the building for $250 each. A combination of that funding plus donations from private citizens and foundations, grants, city and state money, and revenue from renting the building to AAU basketball teams and other groups has brought the 100,000-square-foot facility to life.

Today, PYB offers athletic competition and training there, along with a variety of off-court enrichment programs for some 1,600 kids and teens. Previously, PYB held practices, games, and after-school activities at middle schools in North and Northwest Philadelphia. Now, the Horwitz Center is the hub, and the organization has expanded its reach to 24 middle schools, says PYB chief mission officer Ameen Akbar.

“Basketball is the carrot,” he says. “It’s how I grew up and a lot of us grew up in Philadelphia. That is the avenue we use to connect kids with quality coach-mentors and solid adults in the area. Then, we introduce them to the developmental programs.”

Like the Enon Eagles, PYB offers a good program and a great model. Like Vare and eventually like FDR, it offers a place to play that reflects the worth of our youth sports. Of our youth themselves. We could use many more.

In a city with a Chamber of Commerce that knows good and well the benefits of having families rooted and happy here; with the immense reach and vision of Comcast and Comcast Spectacor; with the talent and cash of the Sixers and the Flyers and the forthcoming WNBA team; with the heart and heft of two world-champion pro teams, each with its own stadium (and a new one maybe in the offing); and with our universities, rife with sports and with young talent itching for work experience, what other viable models of support might exist? How many rec centers could be adopted? How many more teams could get coaching help? Or lighting for their fields? Or new fencing? How many 10-year corporate commitments to paying for field upkeep or uniform donation or training programs for community members might make a difference to countless children and neighborhoods?

The World Cup is coming to town in a handful of months, with some $770 million in economic impact, reports suggest. How about taking a hefty sliver of the tax money coming in and using it to bolster Inter Philly and other soccer initiatives? Major League Baseball will likely throw a few million toward youth sports this summer when Philadelphia hosts the All-Star Game, as it did in 2025 in Atlanta. Now is the time to figure out how to find matching donors, how to use that money to roll into bigger public-private partnerships, how to invest in something more lasting than patching up our fields for a season. Now is the time to understand what is at stake in this moment, to proceed with intention. Ahead of the massive sports year that will be 2026 in Philadelphia, why not appoint a youth sports czar, Mayor Parker?

The overwhelming benefits of citywide youth sports programs and more facilities to host them — like Vare, like Marian Anderson — will help the next generations build a sturdier, safer, stronger urban fabric. It will also create that now, in real time. It will boost our neighborhoods. “We’ve seen the community embrace us,” the Sharks’ Mathis says. And obviously, as he notes, it also makes a difference to our young people, who have an outlet and a place they can claim — and come into — as their own. Something every kid deserves.

Published as “Leveling the Field” in the December 2025/January 2026 issue of Philadelphia magazine.

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How Philly Fell for Krampus — and a Darker Kind of Christmas

The Parade of Spirits in Liberty Lands Park originated as a Krampus parade. / Photography by Laura Swartz

Listen to the audio edition here:

On a cold December night in Northern Liberties, Liberty Lands Park fills with bells, drums, horns, and fur. Lanterns glow. A bonfire crackles. A Slavic choir sings. This is the Parade of Spirits, an annual winter procession that winds through the neighborhood in celebration of the darker side of seasonal folklore.

The most popular costume? Krampus, an imposing figure from Alpine winter traditions. Think of him kind of like the anti-Santa: While St. Nicholas rewards good little children, Krampus punishes the naughty ones. He’s usually depicted as a horned, demon-like creature with fur, cloven hooves, a long tongue, and chains or birch sticks, which he uses to scare or “discipline” misbehaving kids. Some carry a basket on their backs to kidnap babies. (And while he’s now linked to Christmas, there’s evidence that Krampus dates back to pre-Germanic paganism.)

Krampus at Parade of Spirits

In Europe, Krampus shows up on Krampusnacht (December 5th), when people dress up in elaborate, terrifying costumes and roam the streets in a mix of folk tradition, winter ritual, and controlled chaos. NoLibs’ Parade of Spirits, in fact, was originally called Krampuslauf when it began in 2011, modeled after the European parades. But the event has now grown into one of the city’s most distinctive and inclusive holiday gatherings.

In a season often dominated by forced cheer and commercial gloss, Philly is embracing a little darkness, a little rebellion, and a reminder that the holidays don’t have to look the same for everyone.

Philly’s Dark Christmas

“There’ll be scary ghost stories” always seemed like a random line to throw into a caroling standard, but there’s always been a little darkness to Christmas here. Anyone who’s walked through Wanamaker’s Dickens Village as a kid likely has visceral memories of the chained ghosts overhead and eerie graveyard scenes lifted from A Christmas Carol. Is it any surprise that, in a city with little patience for forced cheer, we’ve embraced the alternative?

“I’m so tired of the holly jolly sometimes, I think it’s almost too much holly jolly,” Michael Dalpe told me as we spoke at the Parade of Spirits. (He described his furry, red costume as “Cruella de Vil, but for Elmos.”) “It’s dark, it’s cold, it’s gross — let’s get the friends together and be weird.”

Michael Dalpe at the Parade of Spirits

Look around the city and you’ll see that the Parade of Spirits isn’t the only place to embrace the darkness. Last weekend, Manayunk’s Lincoln Mill Haunted House held “A Twisted Christmas” full of “sinister winter creatures” and scare actors at every corner. That same weekend, East Kensington Arts Committee held “Haunted Christmas” at Philadelphia Brewing Co., complete with spooky films, music, and vendors. There’s currently a pop-up Emo Christmas bar in the basement of the Divine Lorraine. And, for the first time, Fort Mifflin hosted its own Krampusnacht Festival on December 5th, the traditional night Europe celebrates the creature.

But that wasn’t the only Krampusnacht: Prism Arts held one that same night, with burlesque, art vendors, tattoos by the neighboring Houndstooth Tattoo, and of course, the man — er, beast — himself.

Cleary, Krampus held the key to this fascinating spiral into holiday darkness. So, I went out searching for them. And they had an Instagram account.

Enter Philly Krampus

Philly Krampus at the Parade of Spirits

Few people are more closely associated with Krampus’s rise in Philadelphia than Brandon Monahan, better known as Philly Krampus. Their @phillykrampus page shows a full schedule of appearances, which this year have ranged from metal bar Doom to bookstores to Conshy’s witchy shop Thirteen Circles to a dog bakery.

But Monahan didn’t set out to become a recognizable holiday figure. A few years ago, they were helping run punk shows and community events at Noble Earth, a tea lounge in Bristol, when the idea of a Krampus-themed fundraiser came up. When the original performer canceled shortly before the event, Monahan stepped in and built a costume with pieces from ScarePros in Levitttown.

“The original suit, I was wearing a sweater,” Monahan says. “It wasn’t even a gorilla suit yet.”

Over time, the costume became more elaborate, growing into the recognizable Philly Krampus we see today — complete with Austrian-made bells, basket, and horsehair whip. Monahan hopes to make it even more authentic going forward, commissioning a hand-carved wooden mask in the future.

When the pandemic shut everything down, the costume became a way to bring some levity into an otherwise bleak moment. Philly Krampus began making surprise appearances at friends’ tattoo shops, coffee shops, and small businesses. “It was kind of my way to cheer people up during COVID, because everything sucked,” Monahan says.

From there, the character spread quickly — first through word of mouth, then through Instagram. Businesses began requesting appearances, and Philly Krampus started doing low-cost photo ops, donating tips to charity.

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Over the past several years, they’ve raised thousands of dollars, including more than $2,000 this season alone for the Satanic Temple’s abortion fund and reproductive health clinics. While the name may shock people, Monahan describes the Satanic Temple as an organization focused on bodily autonomy, church-state separation, and civil liberties. “If you look more into them, they are more of a political movement than anything,” they explain. “So, it’s like a punk-rock ACLU?” I ask. Monahan approves.

That political edge, they argue, is part of what makes Krampus feel newly relevant. “One of the biggest things about Krampus is that Krampus is anti-fascist,” says Monahan. Historically, Krampus traditions in Alpine regions were suppressed around World War II, when the Nazis attempted to eliminate folk customs and reshape Christmas in their image. “So much of it was destroyed. The tradition was almost killed,” Monahan explains. Reclaiming the figure now feels pointed. “With the way the government is going right now, I absolutely love to be an anti-fascist Krampus,” they say. “It’s nice to be a little rebellious devil.”

The response from the public has been overwhelmingly positive. Philly Krampus appears at places they describe as being “run by weirdos of some sort,” in the best way: “For the most part, everyone has loved it or been very chill about it.” Concerns about frightening children, a common critique, haven’t borne out. In some cases, kids warm up over time — high-fives first, photos later. And if a kid is too scared? “I’ll call it and be like, we’re not taking a photo, sorry.” As for the December 5th Krampusnacht event they helped start this year, Monahan hopes to make it an annual thing.

Part of the appeal, Monahan believes, is that alternative culture has moved from the margins to the mainstream. “Growing up, I was bullied for dressing the way that I do, and people hated on the emo kids and the goth kids. And I think that somewhere along the lines, whether it’s through music or horror movies or whatever, it just became trendy.” (They also point to the 2015 horror movie Krampus as popularizing the character in America, but warn that it is not an accurate depiction of the lore.)

A Krampus for the Rest of Us

Seph Gorgar paired a Mummers outfit with Krampus for the Parade of Spirits.

At the Parade of Spirits, that symbolism feels less theoretical. Krampus isn’t an outlier there — he’s one figure among many finding community and joy. “It’s cool to see everyone putting in their own element to being Krampus,” says Monahan, who attends every year.

The event invites reinterpretation, and costumes range from historically inspired Alpine designs to playful Philly hybrids: one Krampus I met there, Seph Gorgar, paired the iconography with a Mummers outfit. He’s been coming to the event for more than a decade, he tells me, but has seen it grow and the costumes become more widespread and elaborate. What’s changed, Gorgar believes, is exposure — and curiosity. “In America, they just focus in on Santa Claus, and they stole St. Nick,” he says, but now people are discovering “all these other crazy characters.”

Michael O’Hara, a Krampus improvised with a red necktie for a tongue, agrees: “It’s like an extra Halloween. And I think that’s the appeal…these sort of older traditions, people were kind of like why not?”

Michael O’Hara’s improvised Krampus at the Parade of Spirits

And as for his darker overtones? Dalpe, my new furry Elmo-monster friend, explains, “We want something to root against … In a world where there are so many real-life horrors, there’s something, I think, almost comforting about a children’s story that can be overcome.”

The Parade of Spirits embodies that shift. It’s communal rather than consumer-driven, rooted in folklore rather than branding, and open to interpretation rather than strict tradition. In that context, Krampus isn’t just a devilish counterpoint to Santa — he’s part of a larger movement toward reclaiming the darker, stranger edges of winter celebrations.

As Philly Krampus put it, watching the crowd of costumed figures gather there each year, “I’m happy that people are down to be fucking weird.”

Want to catch Philly Krampus before the season ends? He’ll be at Laine’s Gluten-Free Bakery in Berwyn on Saturday, December 20th from 10 a.m. till 2 p.m., and at Doom Bar on Sunday, December 21st from 5 to 9 p.m.

What to Expect From Greg Vernick’s New Restaurant

Chefs Meri Medoway and Greg Vernick making pasta. / Photograph by Liz Barclay

It has been a long time since Greg Vernick opened a new restaurant.

It was 2019 when he first unlocked the doors at Vernick Fish. That was six years and a whole different world ago. Before that, it was the original Vernick Food & Drink, which opened in 2012 and helped to rewrite this city’s culinary DNA with grill-fired sourdough toasts topped with fromage blanc and pickled cherries.

It’s funny, looking back on the review Philly Mag’s critic, Trey Popp, wrote back in August of 2012, because the very first line is a quote from Greg himself, talking about opening new restaurants.

“Opening a restaurant is kind of like getting a tattoo,” he says. “Once you have one, all you can think about is getting the next one.”

And now, that’s exactly what he’s doing. After two years of planning, and months of build-out, menu testing, and research trips to Italy, he is finally almost ready to open his third restaurant — a mid-sized, Italian-focused spot at 2406 Frankford Avenue in Kensington called Emilia — with longtime chef de cuisine Meri Medoway

“Emilia will have the energy and everydayness of a neighborhood destination and the spirit of a trattoria,” Greg says. A pasta-forward concept, minimalist design, complimentary bread service with homemade focaccia, and lounge seating held aside for walk-ins and neighbors. There’s a wood-fired grill (because it wouldn’t really be a Vernick restaurant without one) and a collaborative menu that’s based on the collected dining memories of Vernick and Medoway’s lifetimes spent around Italian food.

And the location? That’s interesting to me because for such a long time, that kind of Kensington/Fishtown corridor was a place where young, small restaurateurs went to open their first restaurants. It’s where Philly worked out what it meant to be Philly, in a dining sense. But Vernick is a big name. And Emilia is neither small nor particularly risky — at least no more risky than any other new restaurant opening. So why Kensington?

Experience, Greg says. “After years of frequenting the area with my wife, Julie, the chance to introduce our new concept in this distinct pocket of the city felt like our right next step.” The area has always reminded him of his time in the East Village, early on in his career. There’s a vitality there. A sense of things being built. Of things happening. Plus, the building near the corner of Frankford and York? Its owners have been regulars at Vernick Food & Drink since the early days. So both parties knew exactly what they were getting into.

Emilia isn’t huge. Eighty seats, with 60 on the main floor, and an additional 20 in the bar and lounge area. Those are the ones that are going to be held aside for walk-ins — a trend that appears to be ramping up in Philly lately. Pine Street Grill, the new restaurant from Amanda Shulman and Alex Kemp, is doing the exact same thing.

The menu is still being worked on, but it looks like it’ll settle out around 18 dishes — six small plates, six large ones, and six pastas. There’ll be a tortellini in brodo that Medoway based on a handwritten recipe she got while traveling in Emilia Romagna, a chicken ragú bianco that she and Greg tasted as a staff meal at the American Academy in Rome while on a research trip, rabbit cacciatore from the grill, and rotating specials to make the place feel fresh and alive. Medoway has spent years cooking with Vernick. She started as an intern at Vernick Food & Drink, bounced around, did her own thing, came back to help open Vernick Fish, and went back to Food & Drink in 2021. At Emilia, she’ll be in charge of the day-to-day.

And we’ll all get to see for ourselves what Emilia can do very soon. The opening is officially being scheduled for “early 2026,” and while there’s no official hard date yet, the team is hoping to have things ready in late January — post-holidays, which is smart, but just a few short weeks from now.

Here’s hoping they can hit that date. Because after all these years of waiting, I know Greg must be anxious for that third tattoo.

Want to Know What to Get at Palizzi Social Club? We Asked Philly’s Best Chefs

Palizzi Social Club has been an institution since opening its doors on December 11, 1918. More than a century later — and with acclaimed chef and current president Joey Baldino at the helm — the members-only spot isn’t just surviving; it’s thriving.

The Club is one of the most coveted reservations in town. Sure, it’s exclusive, but the real draw is the food. Baldino is serving some of the best Italian food you’ll find in Philly, making it a favorite among chefs, bartenders, and hospitality professionals.

Curious to know what some of Philly’s top industry folks like to get, I asked a handful to share their go-to orders. From a crowd-pleasing seafood pasta to a clarified dirty martini, here’s what the city’s food and drink elite are having.

What to Eat

Sesame semolina bread and panzarotti

Bread Basket

Yes, you read that right. At Palizzi, the bread basket — often, an afterthought at restaurants — is a worthy warm-up act. There’s a crusty sesame semolina loaf, crunchy breadsticks, and a mozzarella and anchovy panzarotti, and salsa picante on the side. It’s a beauty to behold for any carb lover and sets the tone for the rest of dinner.

Friday Saturday Sunday’s Chad Williams likes the bread so much that he asks for an extra basket whenever he’s there. Kampar’s beverage director and general manager Sam Pritchard is also a big fan — “Heck, the whole bread service is worth the trip,” he says — while Liberty Kitchen’s executive chef Beau Neidhardt confesses he’ll “slaughter the bread.”

Panzarotti

Every year, Baldino looks forward to the panzarotti at his cousin’s Christmas Eve dinner. While they might not get an invite to that soirée, Palizzi diners can enjoy a similar version, made with mozzarella and anchovy for a pleasantly briny flavor.

Neidhardt says “the mozzarella and anchovy panzarotti stands no chance” when he’s there, while Pritchard calls Palizzi’s take on the dish “unmatched.”

Classic Caesar

Palizzi’s humble Caesar — made traditionally with romaine lettuce, shaved Parmigiano, and anchovy — has won over the likes of Marc Vetri, Mike Solomonov, and Jesse Ito. And the list goes on: Michael Vincent Ferreri of Irwin’s, The Lovers Bar’s head bartender Paul MacDonald, Machine Shop pastry chef Emily Riddell, Rachel Lorn of Mawn and Sao, Alex Kemp of My Loup and Pine Street Grill, and Friday Saturday Sunday’s Hanna Williams all love the club staple, too.

While the Caesar is a pretty fuss-free dish — down to its no-frills presentation in a little wooden bowl — Baldino has still made his own mark on the salad. “We put our little twist on it, balancing the intense heat of the garlic with milder shallot and adding a sprinkle of thyme to round out the flavor,” he says in his book, Dinner at the Club: 100 Years of Stories and Recipes From South Philly’s Palizzi Social Club, written with Philadelphia magazine contributor Adam Erace.

There’s also the addition of Locatelli pecorino in the dressing — Baldino’s nod to the more affordable cheese that many Italian American families would have in their kitchens when he was growing up — and croutons made from the club’s sesame semolina bread.

Stromboli

Palizzi’s stromboli is a must whenever Ferreri or My Loup’s bar director Jillian Moore visits.

This version tastes just like the stromboli Baldino’s mom would make him growing up, filled with mozzarella and pepperoni and tinged with oregano and garlic. It’s also served the same way, without marinara. (But we won’t tell if you dunk it into the salsa picante that comes with the bread basket.)

Spaghetti with crabs

Spaghetti With Crabs

By far the most in-demand pasta dish on the menu, the spaghetti with crabs is unsurprisingly a hit with Philly’s culinary elite. “If you ask me, a meal at Palizzi is not complete without the crab spaghetti,” Kalaya’s Nok Suntaranon says. “Without being too heavy, the crab gravy is layered with flavor from delicious additions like anchovies and clam juice. I just love it.” The sauce gets its rich taste from whole blue crabs simmered in marinara for two hours. The crabs are left to sit in the mixture as it cools; anchovy fillets and clam juice add umami, while Chablis and brandy are added for a deeper flavor.

The dish has also won over Chad Williams, Ferreri, Ito, and Vetri — for whom the menu item is particularly personal. “The spaghetti with crabs holds a special place in my heart, as it’s a dish I would often share with my father,” Vetri says, speaking of his late dad, Salvatore. And it’s a meaningful dish for My Loup’s Moore. “I actually cried the first time I had the crabs and spaghetti,” she says, “because of how much it reminded me of my grandfather’s recipe.”

Escarole and beans

Escarole and Beans

One of Baldino’s Palizzi favorites is also one of the simplest items on the menu: the escarole and beans. The wintry classic is doused in olive oil, covered in grated Parmigiano-Reggiano, and served with a grilled hunk of sesame semolina bread on the side — ideal for dipping and mopping up the dregs of the bowl.

While the club president prefers to eat the vegetarian-friendly dish as it is, Alice bartender Justin Bruno orders it with extra protein on the side. “My go-to order is a timeless combo: sausage alongside escarole and beans,” Bruno says. “Mixed together, it’s the perfect balance of comfort and flavor.”

Lamb chops

Lamb Chops

“The lamb lollipops may be the best thing on the menu,” Kampar’s Pritchard says. They’re also a must-order for My Loup and Pine Street Grill’s Alex Kemp and Amanda Shulman — the latter considers them “the perfect dish.” Chad and Hanna Williams, MacDonald, and Phila Lorn of Mawn and Sao regularly get the chops, too. “I must look hungry because they always send out the lamb chops,” Phila says. “All of this happens after midnight.”

Before they’re tossed on the grill, the chops are rubbed with anchovy paste, lemon, rosemary, and bay leaves, then left to marinate before they’re coated in oil and cooked until they’re just medium.

Raviolo Vasto

Another pasta highlight, the raviolo Vasto — named for the Abruzzese town that the Club’s original members hailed from — is fun to split with dining companions. Slice the giant spinach and ricotta-filled parcel down the middle and an egg yolk glides out, deepening the rich notes of the sage-infused brown butter sauce and giving the dish a silky finish.

Moore always gets the raviolo when it’s available, while Chad Williams and Solomonov are also fond of the pasta. For Solomonov, it’s cozy food like this that makes dining here feel like an intimate experience. “Eating at Palizzi feels like an invite to Joey’s Sunday supper,” he says.

Chicken Cutlet

The chicken cutlet, often available on Palizzi’s late-night menu, is a crowd-pleaser with hungry industry folks after a long shift — including Ito, the Lorns, and Moore.

Prepared similarly to the club’s veal cutlets, the chicken is pounded flat and marinated in Palizzi’s “Club Rub” (parsley, garlic, and red pepper flakes), then dusted in flour, dipped in egg, and coated in a breadcrumb mix with dried oregano and Parmigiano-Reggiano before they’re fried until crispy. The result? A delicious, nostalgic after-hours snack.

What to Drink

Cocktails from Palizzi Social Club

Whether they’re gathered at the main bar or upstairs at the President’s Room, the city’s hospitality pros like to end a long day cradling everything from a Peroni to one of Palizzi’s signature cocktails.

Many, including Ferreri, Neidhardt, and the Williamses, opt for a classic Negroni, made the traditional way with equal parts gin (here, they use Beefeater), Campari, and sweet vermouth, served on the rocks.

Martinis are also, unsurprisingly, popular. Much of the menu at the President’s Room is dedicated to the drink, from a grown-up appletini to a clarified dirty martini — a regular order for Baldino and Moore, who also like to get the house espresso martini (a favorite of Rachel Lorn’s, too). While Kemp is partial to a classic dirty martini, Ferreri drinks his gin martini with an olive, lemon, and orange twist; and MacDonald of The Lovers Bar starts a night at the club with “a proper, grown-up martini” — made with two parts gin, one part vermouth, and a lemon twist — before finishing it with Lambrusco.

Kampar’s beverage wizard Pritchard often gets the Cosmopolitan and says bartender Gabrielle Fenerty makes “the best Cosmo I have ever had.” Or, Pritchard will go off-book to try drinks that aren’t on the menu. “While the menu cocktails are always great, I think watching Jorgen [Eriksen, Palizzi’s general manager and beverage director] play with off-menu rum cocktails is one of life’s best delights,” he says. Pritchard also enjoys the “fancy Stoli-Doli” — a take on the pineapple-infused vodka martini popularized by the Capital Grille — that Eriksen and bartender Jason Ferraro make.

As for Palizzi’s signature cocktails, Rachel Lorn orders The DiCicco, named after Dominico DiCicco (who served as club president in the ‘30s) and made with olive oil-washed vodka, dry and white vermouth, and a lemon peel garnish. Baldino likes to get The Bozzelli, named for another of his predecessors, Michele Bozzelli (Palizzi president from 1946 to 1951). A spicy spin on a Last Word, the beverage is made with gin, Galliano, Cocchi Americano, and a few drops of a house-made habanero tincture, which gives the drink a warm finish. “The Bozzelli is my favorite drink on the menu and how I test our bartenders,” Baldino wrote in his cookbook. “If they can correctly make this cocktail,” he adds, “I know they’re in good shape.”

Philly Fromage Expert Emilia D’Albero Explains How to Live Your Best Cheese Life

Cheesemonger Olympics gold medalist Emilia D’Albero / Photograph by Stevie Chris

South Philly’s own Emilia D’Albero recently became the first American ever to win a gold medal at the Cheesemonger Olympics in France. Here, she talks Cooper Sharp, living in Point Breeze, and the one huge mistake you’re making with your pecorino.

I was named after … my great-grandmother, who came over on the boat from Italy when she was a teenager.

My job is … spreading knowledge and passion for cheese. I handle sales and marketing for a company that sells cheese packaging and storage and tools.

One cheese I do not like is … industrial-produced Brie that has the rind sprayed on and tastes how I imagine diaper to taste.

The stinkiest cheese you can eat is … Foxglove from Tulip Tree Creamery.

When I want to relax … I watch any hospital TV show. I love watching stressful situations on TV. Watching stressful situations somehow makes me feel less stressed.

My partner, Tommy, is … also a champion cheesemonger, and he is the category manager of cheese and charcuterie for DiBruno’s.

When I was a kid, I wanted to grow up to be … a marine biologist, but it turned out that science wasn’t my strong suit.

I became a cheesemonger by … accident. I was working for Eataly corporate in New York and wanted to become a butcher, and they told me to start on the cheese counter and learn some knife skills. Then I fell in love with cheese, and that was eight years ago.

When I am not thinking about cheese, I am … playing with our dog, Bruna Alpina, named after a brown Swiss dairy cow breed.

A cheesemonger is … someone who specializes in the sale of cheese, butter and other dairy products. But we also tell the stories of the cheese and represent the producers and connect customers with their favorite cheeses. We are stewards and educators.

If you ask me to play Fuck, Marry, Kill with Cooper Sharp, Cheez Whiz, and provolone, I would … kill Cheez Whiz, obviously. I’d marry provolone. And I would absolutely fuck Cooper Sharp. I’m such a Cooper Sharp girl. It’s the only cheese I always have in my fridge.

The most expensive cheese I have encountered is … a Smeraldo white truffle pecorino for around $100 per pound.

People like cheese so much because … there is a cheese for every palate, and also, cheese is a taste of the moment in history when it was made and the place where it was made. Every cheese tells a different story.

If you want me to talk about something other than cheese, you should probably ask me about … sharks or 2000–2010 emo music.

Emilia D’Albero wins the gold medal earlier this year (photo by Alexandre Alloul)

One cheese you should consider for a holiday gift is … Gruyère Alpage, a raw cow’s milk cheese made at a super high elevation in Switzerland. The cows eat such a lush mix of grasses, flowers, and herbs. It comes from a tradition that has lasted hundreds and hundreds of years. And it’s very labor intensive keeping this tradition alive.

The best cheese for a grilled cheese is … Comté, a younger profile but still with that oniony, savory note, and it melts well.

I celebrated my big win by … traveling through France and Italy with my partner, my best friend, and my boss – and eating more cheese.

If you want to try making cheese at home, I would start with … not doing it. Leave the cheese to the professionals. Seriously.

One mistake most people make with cheese is … wrapping it in plastic wrap. That suffocates your cheese and makes it mold faster. Also, buying too much cheese all at once. The key is buying less cheese more often.

The most beautiful space in Philadelphia is … Suraya. Whenever someone visits me, I take them there. And their brunch is unreal.

Living in Point Breeze is … better than I ever dreamed it could be. My quality of life is one I never thought I would have.

On New Year’s Eve, you will find me … dipping nontraditional things into a very high-quality fondue.

The second-best food to cheese is … steak.

A local cheesemaker you should visit is … Birchrun Hills Farm and Perrystead Dairy.

I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but … I love eating puffy Cheetos. As a cheese professional, that feels sinful.

Published as “One of Us: Emilia D’Albero” in the December 2025/January 2026 issue of Philadelphia magazine.

Everything You Need to Know About Pine Street Grill’s Surprise Opening

Dishes at Pine Street Grill / Photograph by Bre Furlong

Howdy, buckaroos! And welcome back to the weekly Foobooz food news round-up. With the holidays upon us, you’d think that things would be slowing down in restaurant world, but we’ve got lots of big news happening this week, including (but not limited to) Amanda Shulman and Alex Kemp’s new restaurant, a coffee shop for the Navy Yard, high-end Mexican in Market East, last-minute gift ideas, and a big Dry January event for all you N/A cocktail fans out there. So let’s get right into it, shall we? We’ll start things off this week with …

Pine Street Grill’s Surprise Opening

Pine Street Grill-co-owners Amanda Shulman and Alex Kemp / Photograph by Bre Furlong

It was way back in July when we first heard the name Pine Street Grill. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and we got tipped off (courtesy of some internet sleuthing) that chefs Amanda Shulman and Alex Kemp were sniffing around Fitler Square for a third location, looking to capitalize on the twin successes of Her Place Supper Club and My Loup.

They had a space (the old Dmitri’s at 2227 Pine Street) and they had a name — Pine Street Grill — but back in July, that was pretty much all we knew. And up until about a week ago, we didn’t really have any additional details other than it was going to be an American-style neighborhood spot with a bar and lots of seats held out for walk-ins.

Then, a few days ago (and just weeks after Her Place brought home a Michelin star for Philly), Pine Street Grill opened. I mean, I’m sure it looked different from behind the curtain, but out here in the world, Pine Street just popped into existence, fully formed and ready to serve.

“Join us for a burger and a beer, a rotisserie chicken, a familiar eggplant parm, wings or a salad,” the team said on Instagram. “Bring your babies. Come watch the game. We’ll soon be open every day but Tuesday but have a few funky days while we get our footing and celebrate the holidays. We are so proud of our team and can’t wait to show you what we’ve been working on. Cheers!”

Reservations are available, but half the tables are reserved for neighbors and walk-ins (a new-ish trend in our suddenly-reservations-starved city that I am a big fan of). The menu is straightforward, comforting, and approachable. There are mortadella-stuffed cherry peppers and chicken nuggets with buttermilk ranch, shrimp Louie and soft pretzels with mustard hollandaise. You can have wings or a half rotisserie chicken with gravy, a double-decker smashburger with a side of house mac and cheese, matzah ball soup or acorn squash stuffed fondue, all of it done with the kind of attention to detail that Shulman, Kemp, and their team (including chef de cuisine Jonathan Rodriguez) lavish on everything. There’s a happy hour program with $8 small plates and $10 glasses of red, a kids’ menu, and late-night burger-and-a-beer specials for the adults: $20 for a pint and the house PSG burger with two dry-aged patties, Cooper Sharp, and onion on a seeded milk bun.

Pine Street was open Monday, closed on Tuesday, and is coming back today at 4 p.m. for happy hour. You can make reservations or, you know, just walk right on in if you’re feeling lucky.

Now what else is happening this week …

Hanukkah at Famous 4th Street

Latkes at 4th Street Deli / Photograph by Gab Bonghi

Speaking of Michelin restaurants, Famous 4th Street Delicatessen, the 100-year-old Jewish deli which scored a Bib Gourmand nod at last month’s Michelin ceremony, is right in the middle of its big Hanukkah prix-fixe.

It started on Sunday, December 14th and will run through the 22nd. Included in the multi-course spread are chopped liver with onions served on challah, kreplach dumplings, potato latkes with applesauce and sour cream, herb-roasted chicken or beef brisket, roasted green beans with herb butter, and an assortment of sweet rugelach and sufganiyot for dessert. Best thing about this dinner? They’re letting it go for $39 per person, dine-in or take-out, which is a great deal. Second-best thing? For $155 they’ll set up a whole to-go Hanukkah dinner kit for four people, available for pickup or delivery right here.

Coffee and Wine in the Navy Yard

Happy Bear Coffee rendering by RHJ Associates

The Navy Yard is in the process of turning itself into a destination — a mixed-use retail/residential/service community with a multi-year plan to bring in apartments, shops, restaurants, and everything else a redeveloping neighborhood needs.

One of those necessary things? A coffee shop. A place for people to gather, get their morning jolt, sip lattes and maybe have a sandwich, too. And right now, it looks like Happy Bear is set to be that coffee shop. Founded in 2023 by pals Dan Kredensor and Frank Orman, Happy Bear was a purely online venture — a coffee company and hospitality brand with a charitable bent, pledging five percent of all proceeds to causes chosen by their customers.

Now, though, it looks like Kredensor and Orman will be moving from the virtual to the physical because they’ve just signed the papers on a 3,000-square-foot space on the first floor of a life sciences building at 1201 Normandy Place and will turn it into their flagship brick-and-mortar location — a combination coffee shop, cafe, and wine bar with an opening planned for spring 2026.

Happy Bear will be doing the specialty coffees they’re already known for and expanding into offering a curated wine list and “a refined menu of sandwiches, breakfast items, soups, salads, flatbreads, tomato pie, and other chef-inspired grab-and-go offerings.” So an all-day cafe, essentially, offering all the Philly classics courtesy of a partnership with Carlino’s Specialty Foods.

When construction is done, there’ll be a wine bar and indoor seating, plus an outdoor space overlooking the five-acre Central Green Park. The interesting thing about all this is that, right now, much of what the Navy Yard might become is still speculative. The “retail corridor” that Happy Bear is supposed to be a part of is still being constructed; some apartments are for lease, but many are not. The whole thing becomes a kind of chicken-or-the-egg problem: People won’t want to move to the area if there are no amenities (like coffee shops and wine bars) in the neighborhood. But without many people living there (yet), who is going to visit the coffee shop?

Yes, there are businesses in the area. And yes, people move through the Navy Yard for a variety of reasons. But it’s still going to be an interesting project to watch. I mean, look at Fishtown a decade ago. Or Kensington. Or North Broad. Who knows what might happen at the Navy Yard.

But in any event, soon there’ll soon be a place to get a cup of coffee and a glass of wine. Because you gotta start somewhere.

Now who has room for some leftovers?

The Leftovers

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A post shared by MI VIDA® (@mividamexico)

We’ve got another opening just recently announced, this one in Market East, and it’s kind of a big deal.

Washington D.C.-based (and James Beard Award semifinalist) KNEAD Hospitality is coming to town with their first expansion outside of the D.C. market. They’re taking 8,000 square feet of space at 1150 Ludlow Street and turning it into the first Philly location of Mi Vida — an upscale Mexican concept inspired by Mexico City’s culinary scene. Chef Roberto Santibañez already has three locations in D.C. in partnership with KNEAD, offering bright colors and modern Mexican vibes. The new spot will be big, and plunked down just steps from the Convention Center, Reading Terminal Market, and all those tourists. So yeah, it’s gonna be a thing.

They were originally hoping for a mid-2025 opening. When that didn’t work out, the date got pushed back and the best guess right now is a mid-January grand opening. Another thing that makes this interesting is that KNEAD’s founders, Jason Berry and Michael Reginbogin, got their starts in Philly. Berry went to Wharton, and Reginbogin spent a year here working for Starr. So while up to this point they’ve focused their attentions on D.C., this new Mi Vida location will be something of a homecoming for them.

Looking for a last-minute gift for the Eagles fan in your life? Bird Gang Spirits and BOTLD have a limited-edition Irish whiskey with a Kelly-green bottle and the 2025 Super Bowl ring on the label. Distilled and aged in Cork, and bottled in PA, it’s a three-year Irish whiskey, but you’re really picking it up for the pride. Bottles are available online and in all BOTLD shops.

Photograph courtesy of Bird Gang Spirits

And finally this week, if you’re looking forward to Dry January, then I’ve got the perfect event for you.

Dry Vibes, Philly’s biggest zero-proof “social celebration,” is coming back to Philly on Saturday, January 31st at Billy Penn Studios. There’ll be speakers, vendor tastings, an open dry bar full of mocktails, pop-ups from Philly “wellness brands” and celebrity guests from within the non-alcoholic, better-for-you lifestyle space.

Look, it’s not my kind of thing (the word “wellness” just makes me itch), but I know there are lots of you out there who are trying to make changes, live healthier or find some social options for yourselves that don’t involve the liberal application of gin, tonic, and some limes. And that’s cool. The new year is for making changes and trying to live a better life despite the myriad horrors of being alive and sentient at this moment in history. Me? I’m going with tacos, pasta, pie, and cocktails. But you do you.

So if you’re down, tickets for Dry Vibes are available now for around 50 bucks. You can get yours right here.

Just a Picture-Perfect Addison Street Proposal

Rob Skalicky proposed to Hannah Beck on Philadelphia’s gorgeous Addison Street. / Photography by RingShot Photography

Proposal season is in full swing at Philadelphia Wedding, and we’re excited to share this “will you” on Addison Street — one of our favorite spots in the city for couples to become engaged. RingShot Photography beautifully snapped the big moment, which you can discover below.

And if you need more inspiration, check out our proposal coverage here. Or if you’d like to submit your own engagement, do so here!

The couple: Hannah Beck, 29, and Rob Skalicky, 30, both of Rittenhouse, where they live with their long-haired chihuahua, Bruno

How they met: Rob and Hannah were introduced by mutual friends while down the Shore, in Ocean City. Shortly after, they went on their first date to Via Locusta, in Rittenhouse. They dated for four years before getting engaged.

The proposal: Rob told Hannah they were heading to drinks at a co-worker’s house followed by a work dinner. It was a beautiful, early November evening, so the couple decided to walk to their destination. He turned onto Addison Street — a classic Philly proposal spot, beloved for its twinkly light-covered trees and historic architecture — and got down on one knee. (The work dinner was, of course, fictive. What followed instead was a romantic night to celebrate their engagement.)

Her reaction: Hannah admits she wasn’t suspicious at all — even though the “work dinner” was scheduled for a Saturday. “He was cool, calm, and collected all day, which kept me totally unassuming,” she says. “It wasn’t until we turned onto Addison Street and Rob started fidgeting with his pockets that I realized the proposal might be happening.” After he asked Hannah to marry him and unveiled his grand scheme, she started crying happy tears. “We went on to have the best night ever.”

His reaction: “I was more nervous for everything to go right — the weather, setting, photographer, plans after, keeping the surprise, etc. — than I was to actually ‘pop the question,’” Rob says. “Seeing how surprised and excited Hannah was made it all the better!”

The post-proposal moments: The soon-to-be weds toasted to their love with celebratory drinks at SkyHigh at the Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia. Then, they went back to the site of their first date — Via Locusta — for dinner. When they arrived home, Hannah was surprised again: Rob’s cousin had decorated their apartment, and a group of friends gathered for an impromptu engagement party at Cavanaugh’s Rittenhouse.

The wedding plans: The two are early in the planning stages, touring Philly-area wedding venues. They hope to wed in the summer or fall of 2027.

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