FAO Schwarz

For those of you unfamiliar with it, FAO Schwarz is a huge toy store in NY that I visited for the first time in '89 or '90 when the New World Symphony played in Carnegie Hall. I remember this really tall kinetic sculpture (a clock?) that used to play this little "welcome to our world of toys" song over and over, ad nauseum, kind of like the "it's a small world" song in the Disneyland ride.

Turns out they've removed the clock. I was sad, but also happy for the employees that they don't have to be continually brainwashed with that song anymore! It was loads of fun to just wander the store.

Up on the second floor, they've got this Legos section where they had a few life-sized figures created entirely of Legos!

Hagrid and Co.

Chewie!

Part of what made the visit memorable was that there was a large group of Orthodox (Hasidic?) Jewish children there, maybe on some school outing. I've talked about the diversity here. In a store in Austin or San Antonio you're not likely to run into 50 little boys with their foreheads shaved and the long sideburns. I got some video of these kids playing on the keyboard that was used in the film "Big":

I also took this short video of the "Flourish and Bott's" section of the store which was dedicated to Harry Potter merchandise.

And to finish this post, I'll also include a quick, touristy video that I took of Rockefeller Plaza as I was leaving FAO Schwarz and heading down 5th Ave. to meet Brie for dinner.