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Scotts Flowers NYC

Opening Hours
Today: 9am–4pm
Fri:
9am–4pm
Sat:
10am–2pm
Sun:
Closed
Mon:
9am–4pm
Tues:
9am–4pm
Wed:
9am–4pm
Location
15 West 37th Street
Scott's Flowers 1 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin

One cannot help but be enveloped by the sweet, fresh smell of flowers upon entering Scotts Flowers. When I commented on the intoxicating scent, Brooke Roman, a sales associate and design consultant, smiled and said, “I’m noseblind to it!” I marveled at the floral masterpieces in the front room, particularly a beautiful purple box overflowing with delicate flowers. I learned that Brooke, herself, had come up with the idea to start creating flower boxes, a concept that she told me is used in Europe, but rarely in the United States.

Upstairs in the office space, Olivia, Tom and I sat down with Rob and Chris, two of the three Palliser brothers. Their father, Robert Palliser, Sr., started the business in Queens before moving to Manhattan in 1982. Opening a flower shop was all he could think to do after getting home from the war: He had never gone to college, but throughout his childhood he spent quite a bit of time in his uncle's florist shop. Over the years, Robert had several different locations, including Park Avenue and 23rd Street, before settling at the current spot in 2006. Although he is semi-retired, his son Chris explained with a grin that his dad still “comes in to bellow and bark at people.”

Despite the fact that all three brothers helped their father work in the shop when they were growing up, each one stated that they had no intention of entering the flower business. Rob studied film and Chris and Jonny, the youngest, majored in business. Rob was the first to join his father at Scotts in 2013 as an interim job, and then got "sucked in." He told us that his biggest contribution to the company was that he “brought in the internet.” The addition of online sales and Rob’s efforts to begin thoroughly branding the company doubled the size of the business in just a year. Meanwhile, Chris was stuck in the business world and was not enjoying it. He was living with Rob in the East Village at the time, and when his older brother asked him to help with the rapidly expanding family business, Chris joined him. Jonny is the newest member of the team, having only graduated college in 2014. After only spending a short time with the three, it was evident that they had each carved out their own niche within the shop - Rob is the charismatic marketing man, Chris is the quiet business mastermind, and Jonny is the hands-on man-of-the-people.

When I asked what Robert Sr. thought of all three of his sons working together in the family business, Chris replied, “My father is to the moon.” It seems that the whole Palliser clan is involved in the shop, including Silvana, the boys’ mother, who occasionally does the bookkeeping. Rob, Chris and Jonny have their suspicions about their father - they are certain that he planted the seed in their minds that caused each of them to ultimately come back to Scotts. Despite the fact that they disliked having to come here during their vacation days when they were school boys, they always noticed when their father would point out the window of the car at signs that had “and Sons” or “and Bros.” on them. At an early age they understood how badly he wanted his flower business to become a family affair. “He was drilling it into our head at a very young age,” Rob commented.

Since the three brothers have taken over, Scotts has experienced many changes. Where the business used to get most of its clients through the wedding industry, now most of the flowers are going to restaurants, hotel lobbies, and corporate events. The company also has a small gardening department for city rooftops. With the addition of an online side to the business, Scotts has been able to implement Same Day Delivery. Rob is also “putting structure into the business” by branding it. The company has a new logo, which has replaced a series of eight different logos that would change depending on the season.

The Palliser brothers are very proud of the charity work that they do, including dedicating arrangements to the Avon Walk to end Breast Cancer. On the day that we visited in early November, the three brothers were celebrating “Movember” - they were not shaving in order to draw attention to men’s health issues. The Pallisers hope to open up a few more locations. “I have a vision. I’d like to go to Brooklyn one day,” Rob mentioned. It was really moving to see three sons working so happily at a trade that their father had strived so hard to build for them. “I love it,” Rob told me, adding that he is always eager to start a day filled with flowers. “I keep waking up early, before my alarm clock.”

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Scott's Flowers 1 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 2 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 3 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 4 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 5 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 6 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 7 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 8 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 9 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 10 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 11 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 12 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 13 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 14 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 15 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 16 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 17 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 18 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 19 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 20 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin
Scott's Flowers 21 Family Owned Florists Garment District Midtown West Tenderloin

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The Flatiron Room Murray Hill

The location was renamed in 2023 as The Flatiron Room Murray Hill. This feature was first published in September 2017. Fine & Rare, shorthand for “fine food and rare spirits” is the latest creation of Tommy Tardie, restaurateur and owner of the Flatiron Room on West 26th Street. In contrast to the more common restaurant theme of the 1920s and 30s, which Tommy considers to have “played out, ” Fine & Rare aims to be an aristocratic parlor straight out of the 1950s, modeled after classic Manhattan hideaways such as The Explorers Club. “The challenge was getting it to look like the Flatiron Room - old world, almost like we discovered it, ” Tommy told the Manhattan Sideways team. The space has had other lives as a Japanese restaurant and a photocopy center - Tommy said that when he first saw the space, it was raw, with concrete floors that had holes them and wires hanging from the ceiling. In 2016, it became a little slice of vintage Manhattan, complete with a repurposed teller booth from Grand Central Station serving as the hosts’ stand. The wallpaper is finely textured with glass and sand, and the stainless steel ceilings are reclaimed parts from a former distillery. Descending into the restaurant, we walked on 125-year-old floorboards from Connecticut that have the names of the restaurant’s investors carved into it. Two of these investors are Tommy’s young sons, River and Sawyer, who each made a $1 investment in the establishment in order to garner a place on the floor. Hanging above the booths are pieces of taxidermy that Tommy believes “bring in some more old world charm. ”The room is large, but because the tables are isolated from one another, each setting is intimate and unique. “Wherever you are in the restaurant, you feel like you’re in your own area. ” Each side of the dining room features a fireplace: one has hand carved marble from Italy, and the other is repurposed from the door of a country schoolhouse. The jazz stage provides a theatrical ambience to the space without overpowering it. “We want the performance to enhance, but not be, the experience. There’s always a show going on even if nothing is onstage. ” The walls are decked out with the restaurant’s inventory of over 1000 bottles, which Tommy noted are, “part of the architecture. ” Some sit atop high shelves and can only be reached by ladders, which members of the staff will climb throughout the night. Others sit in the caged bottle keep, with personalized labels that can be bought. “New York is all about showmanship - people love to put their name on something. ” The back elevated room holds up to thirty-five people and is used for tastings and private events. It has a few hidden elements of its own, including a chandelier and leather and steel door from a masonic hall. While speaking with Tommy, the Manhattan Sideways team sampled a few of the restaurant's scrumptious items, including the burrata served with arugula and an assortment of fruits, the short rib burger, the seafood Cobb salad, and the Greek grain bowl with quinoa, mint, and beet humus. While the Flatrion Room focuses largely on whiskey, Fine & Rare features cocktails with tequila, rum, and brandy. This does not mean that they do not still have some amazing whiskey options, such as the breathtaking smoked Old Fashioned that was presented to us to photograph and then sip. Tommy began his professional career as a creative director in advertising on Madison Avenue, but realized after a dozen years that he was craving something more exciting. “The higher I got on the corporate ladder, the less creative it got. It lost that cool factor. ” He resolved to go the route of the entrepreneur, initially with a few clubs, and later with the Flatiron Room and eventually Fine & Rare in 2017. “With this one, I decided to make the demographic and design a place I’d like to go, as opposed to previous projects that centered on reaching a specific consumer base. " Tommy also remarked on how Fine & Rare is the result of the trial and error from past ventures: “This is as if I got to do it again and I could do it better. I think entrepreneurs are genetically coded to forget how difficult it can be starting out, but a new project is fun. It makes your heart pump and your adrenaline go. ”