Brighton celebrates three years of Jewish hub and holiday resort
The BNJC has much to offer residents and holidaymakers
This summer celebrates the three-year anniversary of the BNJC – a remarkable, and hugely successful, project to create a Jewish seaside holiday resort and homes, here in the UK, a place for people to feel happy and secure within their Jewish identity.
The incredibly prescient idea was that of Mark Sugarman, who became the founding CEO of the BNJC. It was 2019 and there was a patch of land next to the synagogue and discussions were taking place about selling the land.
But then Mark Sugarman, and remember this is pre-October 7, suggested rather than sell the land, why not develop it to create a brand-new space. Forty-five new homes, either for sale or to rent as permanent or holiday homes, in a scheme to reinvigorate the Brighton Jewish community and provide a seaside haven for Jewish people to visit. Somewhere with lifts that are Shabbat-friendly, accommodation that enables visitors to be able to comply with all their religious requirements while at the same time enjoying everything Hove and Brighton have to offer.
A campus for Jewish people, with a restaurant, a nursery for children, a reception hall for parties, weddings, bar and bat mitzvahs, not just for the religious, but also for anyone Jewish.
And this sense of belonging is something that, particularly post-October 7, is especially important for many Jewish people.
As one person said: “When I come here, I feel I belong. That I can relax among my own people. It helps me to find my Judaism, my Jewish identity.”
For religious families, the opportunity to have somewhere to live or stay that is reasonably priced and Shabbat-friendly, is a huge draw.
Sixty years ago, Brighton was a thriving Jewish community with Jewish shops and even a Jewish school. The BNJC hopes, by attracting people to visit, they will encourage them to consider living in the city.
The project is reviving a Jewish tradition that used to see thousands of families flock to stay in kosher hotels in seaside resorts like Bournemouth and Blackpool. The hotels of the past may no longer exist, but the BNJC is the 21st century equivalent, like a holiday Airbnb.
The idea was radical and as it has sadly proved to become even more necessary, when one hears stories of Jewish people in search of accommodation, now being asked to confirm they are not Zionists.
A project of this nature requires a muti-million-pound budget and the BNJC was able to go ahead thanks to the financial support of the Bloom Foundation. Work began on the site at the start of 2020 but, when Covid happened, the building work was nonetheless able to continue with the site finished three years later.
The scheme also provides affordable housing to Jewish families enabling them to live in a two-bedroom, two-bathroom home for a rent of £1,800 a month. The holiday accommodation starts at £120 a night for a flat for up to six people.
Real thought has gone into the project. The flats look like something out of an interior design magazine, all have large airy windows, a spacious kitchen area, sizeable dining tables and comfortable seating. Some even have a balcony and highchairs and cots are readily available. There is a kosher deli on site that stocks everything from meat, ready meals and store cupboard essentials, sweets and chocolates to bottles of wine and Jewish cookery books. And there’s a large Tesco nearby for everything else.
There are 10 five-bedroomed mews houses with private gardens, as well as two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartments and rooftop penthouses. Visitors come from all over the world as word spreads about everything BNJC has to offer.
Yosef Silver who was brought up in Brighton, but whose family moved to Manchester for the Jewish schooling, says: “I now live in Kansas in the USA, but it is wonderful for me to come back to Brighton. My mother lives in the BNJC and I visit her and stay here for up to two months at a time. When I see how the community is flourishing it makes me think about returning here.”
In the three years that it has been running there have been families coming for a welcome seaside break, stag and hen dos, birthday parties and huge family reunions along with creatives visiting to spend time working on new projects.
Of course, one cannot mention Brighton without touching on the well documented antisemitism in this city that had a Green party council until May 2023 and has the Green party’s Siân Berry as the current member of Parliament for the Brighton Pavilion ward.
The city recently hit the headlines when activists were seen going door-to-door, intimidating residents, as they urged them to boycott Israeli products, an action that Sussex Police said it would neither investigate nor record as criminal offences, and there have been pro-Palestinian demonstrations, antisemitic slogans, swastikas and graffiti and antisemitic abuse in public places and on public transport.
Sitting in the Yofi restaurant I asked Brighton-based diners about the antisemitism and people tell me they if you have an outward sign, such as a Magen David you can be subjected to verbal abuse in Brighton town centre.
One resident, who has returned to the UK after living in Israel, says it is much scarier living in the UK than in Israel. She has been subjected to verbal abuse and threats in Brighton town centre and does not feel safe walking round there on her own.
“Brighton is a multi-cultural city but there is a pocket of misguided people who cause trouble.” she said.
In Brighton there are orthodox, liberal, reform and Masorti communities and people say they feel the city council could do far more to support the communities.
Everyone said that within the grounds of the BNJC they feel safe and secure.
The BNJC is very much a haven, enclosed within a metal fenced compound with 24/7 security and an eruv, it is very much an oasis where visitors can feel safe as they eat in the restaurant, go to their homes, call in to the synagogue and where their children attend the Shoresh nursery. The orthodox synagogue is part of the BNJC campus but separate to the BNJC and it has benefited from the new arrivals, with its congregation swelling and services held three times daily.
As a holiday destination Brighton has plenty to offer, including the seaside, the pier, the Royal Pavilion, theatre and the shops in the historic Lanes. For children there is the Hove Museum just around the corner from the BNJC.
Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis says: “This hub of Jewish life will be a beacon of Jewish identity with the power to cultivate interfaith relationships and make a lasting impact on the entire city. I hope that it will put Brighton on the Jewish map and the Jewish community on Brighton’s map.”