The last thing you’d expect beside a bar stool is a baby’s highchair. Although you can’t share sips of Play Pop’s cold brew on tap at the cafe counter with your child, you can share a space where they play amongst other children while you sip your coffee, work on your laptop, or make a new friend. With Play Pop, co-founders and mothers Elina Tunyan and Kris Mae Weiss offer a solution to the isolating nature of raising a family after a pandemic. Their new family club in Hudson is a haven for children ages 0-5 and the whole family with their membership-based services and play space.
“There is no doubt that the remote work culture has influenced young families to make Hudson and the rest of the Hudson Valley their home base,” Tunyan says. “Remote working is a double-edged sword, meaning parents have to juggle working and parenting, simultaneously, where in years past parents would go to an office and children to daycare. This is why Play Pop focuses on supporting the entire family’s needs, from work, to play, and having community.”
The business has always had the parent community at its core, starting from its very inception when Tunyan and Weiss were introduced by a mutual mom-friend. They were both mothers who moved up to Hudson from New York City, where Tunyan graduated from Columbia Business School. Weiss had a background as a photographer and a community volunteer in the area, starting her own community-oriented play space, Upstate Play, during the pandemic to provide a safe pod to Hudson families. Weiss took a break in 2022 to focus on her own family, but in 2023, the two mothers took their different areas of expertise and partnered to start bringing Play Pop to life—a culmination of postpartum support and play.
Play Pop got its start as a pop-up shop in spring of 2023, hopping around from local businesses like Wylde Hudson, Quinnie’s Good Food, and Return Brewing. During their nomadic beginnings, they’d bring play structures and books to the various spaces, where parents could enjoy a craft beer while their kids crafted their own drawings, sand sculptures, or birdhouses. Formerly inhabiting a Barnfox co-working space, Play Pop took over the 2,000-square-foot storefront at 320 Warren Street in October 2023. While the concept is similar—a monthly membership club with unlimited access to the space and refreshments—and the space is still a great place to shoot off a few emails from, Play Pop has made it so much more.
All Play Pop members get unlimited access to the open play space with unlimited snacks to match. They also receive reduced rates on classes and programming such as Music Together and various summer camps. For premium members, drop-off child-care spots allow them to use the service as you would a regular daycare. Non-members can attend classes à la carte.
Opposing the loud blues and reds you’d see in a typical daycare, the open play space is filled with calming, muted natural woods and forest greens. Wooden structures with ladders and slides, a play-kitchen, tent, and toys decorate the space, as well as booths and a bar counter where parents can get fresh fruit, Harney and Sons tea, and snacks. Through a glass door in the back is the infant room, with special toys and padded floors for those still-crawling little ones as well as special program offerings like children’s book author visits from Catskill-based Esme Shapiro and Gabrielle Balkan. Also in the back is an arts and crafts room, where you can find creative events like this summer’s Little Chef and Little Maestro camps, teaching kids to prepare food or make music. The sleepier, shyer bunch may find themselves in a different back room, where kids can have quiet time or take a nap.
Whether you’re there for work, play, drop-off, or a birthday party, you’ll see kids and parents alike forming friendships with people that they may not have met otherwise. “With so many people living away from their families, this is really that family dynamic here,” Tunyan says. “Sometimes, you don’t have the access to that support system like you would with your family. At Play Pop, you know these people and you see them often.”
Play Pop comes at an opportune time—the middle of a childcare crisis. With more and more families moving to the Hudson Valley and an exponential decrease in childcare providers, “families are thinking about Play Pop as part of their decision making to move to Hudson,” Tunyan says. “We’re probably about 10 families away from building up a wait list.” They offer drop off care daily from 9am to 12pm and 2 to 5pm as well as a weekly date-night drop off time on Saturdays from 5 to 7:30pm. Given how quickly they’re growing, the co-founders have entertained thoughts of expansion to other nearby towns; but for now, you can find them in Hudson seven days a week.
Play Pop offers full-time memberships for $250 a month and premium memberships for $288 a week. You can find more information about programming and registration at Play Pop’s website and Instagram.
This article appears in August 2024.
