Zenat Begum

All of Zenat Begum's efforts begin and end with community. In 2016, the first-generation Bengali-American opened Playground Coffee Shop in the former location of her father's hardware shop in Bed-Stuy. A Brooklyn native, Zenat has championed her young staff and neighbours by listening and adapting.

Since then, Playground has expanded to include Playground Annex (a bookshop and shop), Playground Radio and Playground Youth (a non-profit). Most recently, Zenat and her peers have joined forces to set up refrigerators with free produce throughout the borough. To celebrate the release of the Air Jordan III 'Laser Orange', a colourway inspired by strong women, we asked Zenat to share her story.

I'll start from the beginning. My dad's been a contractor; he's built houses before and has a lot of skills. He was very forward-thinking in manifesting the economic power that he never had before. That inspired me to work hard. In creating Playground, I wanted to pay homage to my dad and all of the opportunities he gave me as a child. Now, I'm able to create space and give opportunities to other folks.

At the time, I was enrolled in a liberal arts university, and I was studying at coffee shops, as many young people do. It's a place that supports creativity. I wanted to provide that experience for other people, too. We don't have a lot of sober spaces, where people can hang out during the daytime and get some work done. That was my primary focus—a place for people to utilise during the day, so that they can make advances in their own careers.

Just to start Playground, I had to do community outreach. I reached out to people who are sign painters. I reached out to people who were making chairs. It took a village to make Playground, and it still does to maintain it. We've held town hall meetings to ask our neighbourhood and community members what they want to see. We've had movie screenings, charity events, bake sales, self-defence training, financial literacy classes, radio shows and more.

We started doing mutual aid work not long after quarantine started. I was approached to do a community fridge by my friend, Priscilla Aguilar, who was a middle-school peer of mine. They got the fridge and gave it to us the same day. We were immediately able to get produce from a friend of mine. Things fell into place so naturally.

I remember just being a kid in New York, seeing who had the best sneakers and noticing who was on the court wearing what. New York is all about basketball and ball-oriented games, even handball. Seeing kids play basketball, particularly in public school, is a really inspiring way to come up on sports.

Sometimes, the colourways that come out can inspire the colours we bring into our own lives, if that makes sense. They can help guide what you wear. Every time there's a new shoe or a new colour, it has the power to attract a different person or crowd. I think this colourway is going to reinstate a new love and appreciation for the shoe.

What I've learned is that if you don't have community, you don't have anything. I was in a really rough spot at the beginning of quarantine. I'm very appreciative of the people who've kept me sane during the last few months, because this is not easy work. Playground is a place that has to be around forever, because we're doing the work. We're going to continue doing it, no matter what.

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