For the Love and Zen of Motorcycles
Nuri Wernick - Co-Owner, Rising Wolf Garage, New York, New York
Nuri and her husband Michael are avid motorcycle enthusiasts who turned their passion into a business: together they created the first motorcycle garage in the center of New York City. Since 1997, their business, Rising Wolf Motorcycle Parking Garage in New York’s East Village has housed and protected all kinds of bikes, serving the people who love their machines and the motorcycle lifestyle.
“We have storage options for people who can’t afford to rent a garage for the winter. We serve street parkers when they go away for vacation,” Nuri says. “We serve day trippers who come into the city. They all want a safe place to park and know they can leave it with us.”
Nuri and Michael met back in the 1980s when she was managing a dealership and sold him a motorcycle. They’ve been together ever since. After years of parking their bikes on city streets, they saw a need for people like them, motorcycle owners, who wanted to park their bikes indoors.
From those beginnings, Rising Wolf now provides everything for the enthusiast looking for: a safe place to park and keep their machine in good shape, from battery charging, air compressor and oil, a service area and private parking spots with shelving and electricity. The garage has long term winter storage facilities, and weekly or even daily parking is available.
Nuri and Michael also see a demand for what they are bringing to their clients, all across the country. “There is definitely a need for more garages like ours in urban centers,” she says.
“Real estate is very expensive,” Nuri points out that not every motorcyclist can afford to rent a small garage. “Having a safe and secure garage available on a sliding scale instead of paying regular rent can be very convenient. We hope to spread the love.”
However, much of this changed due to COVID-19’s destructive path earlier this year: New York City was the nation’s epicentre. Nuri’s business in the heart of Manhattan’s East Village had many challenges. “This is Manhattan and everything is social: clubs, bars, restaurants, shops, any business, you name it. Just walking down the street is a social interaction,” Nuri stated empathetically.
She said that “from the very beginning people weren't really believing that anything was happening because it's invisible. It's a silent killer. So a lot of folks were walking without a mask. They weren't really taking it seriously until the numbers started going up, and that's when it hit everybody that they had to lock down and stay home.”
“On the Eastside, it was eerie,” Nuri recounted. “You really could hear a pin drop outside because everybody was inside and would only go out for essential items. Then people started to move away, making plans to move back home or maybe they lost their jobs at that time. There was a big exit.”
This was the beginning of a very difficult time. “By June you could see five to ten moving vans on any given day, up and down the streets. It was pretty eerie. And also you kind of had to keep your wits about you, because people were starting to get desperate, they weren't working.” She said that people “didn’t know if somebody's just following you because they're behind you or if they're following you, because you're going to be a victim.”
Even though times were difficult, Rising Wolf Garage survived due to the personal relationship that Michael and Nuri had with their customer base. They understood their clients’ situations and worked with them, based on their individual circumstances.
She believes her resilience is due her parents’ efforts to make her independent very early in life. This resilience was also key to an early disaster that struck NYC and personally impacted on her and her husband: the 9/11 attack.
Suddenly, the building shook and they lost communication on the walkie-talkies. Tower Two had just collapsed but they didn't know it yet. Soon they received word to evacuate the building and they rushed to the lobby to exit the building.
As they ran from the building, Michael and his firehouse members looked back at the building and “that's when Tower One started to pancake down,” Nuri stated, clearly shaken by the memory. She wouldn’t know for hours later that he survived this disaster.
From this experience, Michael and Nuri were committed to supporting other FDNY members who lived through this disaster. They have contributed through the years since by holding events, fundraisers, convening discussion groups, and organising bike rides into the country-side outside of NYC. Their proudest moment was working on the FDNY Dream Bike project which became a museum piece at the 9/11 Memorial Museum.
From a very young age Nuri was always generating new business ideas. “I knew that I was a leader of some sort, always striving to coordinate activities. There was always some kind of event happening in my life.”
Her path from passion for motorcycling to co-owner of the garage was a natural one. “Motorcycling is a hobby, but it is also a lifestyle,” says Nuri. “I always loved it. And if you can work with what you love, life is good.”
The blue-collar mystique of motorcycling is still strong but has now evolved and become universally accepted. “For many younger people, especially techies,” Nuri opined “a motorcycle is more of a novelty than a lifestyle for them. Maybe they will get their bonus at the end of the year and splurge on a bike. It’s more of a status or image thing.”
She says one thing all motorcycle enthusiasts share is the physical aspect of getting outside on a bike. “It’s absolutely about the love of nature,” says Nuri. “When you’re on a bike, all five of your senses are stimulated, and maybe even a sixth sense at that point!”
“It is a passion,” says Nuri. “It's not that the passion became a lifestyle. It's that the lifestyle became the passion. There's a very thin line between those two things. We love what we do.”