Most cigar shops reflect overstuffed Gilded Age opulence, with leather chairs, mahogany fixtures, and dim lighting leaving guests feeling a step out of time. Thankfully, 5 Star Cigarz isn’t most cigar shops. Its wooden floors and olive-trimmed white shelves bask in the natural light flooding in from floor-to-ceiling front windows. But this modernized appearance doesn’t affect the shop’s selection of cigars, with time-tested favorites from Padron, Macanudo, Arturo Fuente, and Don Diego lurking along the well-stocked walls.

The shop also shows off its collection of shiny water pipes, and a dedicated hookah area welcomes languid smokes and caterpillar impersonations with green, turf-like rugs, potted plants, and a mounted flat-screen TV. These comfy stations are hot real estate during the shop’s weekly events, which range from hookah nights and wine and cheese tastings to impromptu games of duck duck goose.