The best thing about Conni’s Avant Garde Restaurant is that it is a good idea that was kept alive through dedication, aspiration and motivation. Its storyline and classic rock inspired song numbers are beautifully tongue in cheek, reek of irony, and rolled in delight.
September 19, 2011 Boroughing, Classic, Theater
Through December 11, local investigative theater company The Civilians are staging In The Footprint: The Battle Over Atlantic Yards at Fort Greene’s Irondale Center, mere blocks from where this long-debated project is currently underway. We caught up with Michael Friedman, the show’s lyricist and composer, to ask him about process, community dialogue and his personal views on the project.
December 2, 2010 Boroughing, Classic, Theater
The New Brooklyn Cookbook, out last week from William Morrow, was written by Melissa and Brendan Vaughan, recipe developer and magazine editor, respectively, who are sensitive to the idea that “New Brooklyn” is both difficult to define and somewhat polarizing.
October 12, 2010 Classic, Food, Shared Content
On the eve of Greenlight Bookstore’s one year anniversary – actually next month – Jessica Stockton Bagnulo and Rebecca Fitting, the Fort Greene duo who founded the shop, are also set to ring in their first year at the Brooklyn Book Festival. On Friday from 7:30-9PM they’ll host one of the festival’s bookend events, The Brooklyn Indie Party, featuring locals like Melville House and Akashic’s own Johnny Temple, the night’s resident DJ along with music writer Dave Tompkins. We caught up with Jessica to talk birthdays and books.
September 10, 2010 Read Features
The neighborhood of Fort Greene and Clinton Hill is many, many things, but it doesn’t matter how you describe it; the area is a blooming hybrid of everything we love about Brooklyn. The only thing that matters is how fast you can get there.
July 16, 2010 Food, Restaurants, Things to Do
Rakesh Satyal, friend of BrooklynTheBorough.com and author of the novel Blue Boy (Kensington, 2009), recently won the Gay Debut Fiction Award at the 22nd Annual Lambda Literary Awards. Upon being presented with the award, he broken into song – something that he’s well known for doing – and this time he caught the attention of the New Yorker. We caught up with the Fort Greene-based author about the award, his speech and what’s in store for a potential second, musical career path.
June 24, 2010 Authors Speak, Classic, Local/Readings, Queer News, Read Features, Video
As much as Annabelle hated to admit it, the neighborhood really had changed. More progressive types had moved to Brooklyn in the past few years and their liberal antics sometimes made her seriously consider moving back to Montana. Annabelle wasn’t from Fort Greene originally, but she’d lived in the neighborhood a hell of a lot longer than these yo-yos. She was taller and longer than each of them, by at least a foot in both directions. Her tail and claws were much more serious too.
April 21, 2010 Boroughing, Classic, Fiction, Guest AuthorsIn his third edition of a speech almost unheard of on a district level, Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries took on the federal government, the banking and real estate industries and the criminal justice system.
February 2, 2010 Boroughing, City Politics, Classic, Multi/Media, Real Estate, State Politics, VideoDid you know that Brooklyn is the only borough of this great city that does not have a gay pride center? On Thursday, the steps of Borough Hall played host to a collection of Brooklyn heavy hitters to talk about plans to change that.
October 9, 2009 Boroughing, City Politics, Queer News
Residents, elected officials and family members gathered at the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church in Fort Greene this week to remember Shem Walker’s life – an innocent Clinton Hill resident fatally shot by an undercover police officer – and discuss the implications, policy and the prevention of tragedies like this one.
September 24, 2009 Boroughing, City Politics, Classic, State PoliticsBruce Ratner, the mastermind behind the Atlantic Yards Project and part-owner of the New Jersey Nets signed a $200 million deal today to give Russion oligarch Mikhail Prokhorov an 80% stake in the basketball team. Mr. Prokhorov wrote on his LiveJournal blog (translated from Russian by Google) that “participation in [this deal] was made possible by the world crisis (never in the history of foreigners owned NBA).”
September 23, 2009 Real Estate, The Locals
In light of the increasing number of newly painted bike lanes, and the cars who like to defile them, we’ve created a list of new road rules for everyone to help prevent catastrophic crashes between bikes and cars.
September 15, 2009 Classic, Culture, Environment, The Locals, The People
“Great reporting and great journalism have always been the exception to the rule,” Carl Bernstein said after a screening of All The President’s Men at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on Saturday night. For more of the discussion, click through to watch a short video clip.
September 14, 2009 Authors Speak, Boroughing, Classic, Culture, Film, Multi/Media, Video
‘Tis the season for city elections, so in advance of the September 15 primary, Brooklyn The Borough has compiled a list of incumbents and challengers in this year’s contested City Council elections for Brooklyn. There are many challengers this year, and open seats in the 33rd and 39th districts have made for heated races. Issues surrounding sustainable development have driven many candidates out of the woodwork. The pro-development Brooklyn political machine is still alive but questions remain about whether candidates supported by the county’s party boss, Assemblyman Vito Lopez, will sustain themselves despite criticism for their ties to a machine that makes the money flow from Brooklyn based business interests. The term limits extension has also sparked a renewed political engagement in the borough. Many candidates who had planned on running for seats that would have been open before term limits were extended have chosen to challenge incumbents that voted for the extension. We’ve compiled detailed information on each race as well as fundraising totals as the candidates head into the final weekend of the campaign.
September 10, 2009 City Politics, The Locals
A tipster sends in an email, with pictures, regarding the 35th City Council district race, where incumbent Letitia James is being challenged by Delia Hunley-Adossa. Ms. Hunley Adossa is in favor of the Atlantic Yards project and it’s been speculated that her campaign is funded by developers who want to challenge Ms. James’ opposition to the controversial project. The full email after the jump.
September 4, 2009 City Politics, Real Estate, The Locals
In fiscal year 2009, 311 records indicate Brooklyn had 4,042 complaints of bed bugs and 1,729 violations. These numbers place Brooklyn first among all boroughs in number of complaints, with over 50% more complaints than the next closest borough, Manhattan. Dr. Louis Sorkin, a bed bug expert and entomologist at the American Museum of Natural History, thinks the City should offer its residents more education on preventing the spread of these tiny terrors. Here’s the scoop on what to do if you find yourself with these unwanted house guests.
August 9, 2009 Boroughing, City Politics, Culture, Real Estate, The Locals, The PeopleThe Empire State Development Corporation recently held a public hearing on the Atlantic Yards project in a New York City College of Technology auditorium on Jay Street Downtown. Both supporters and opponents of the program made strong showings, although the pro-Yards contingent — a varied collection of Union workers along with members of ACORN or BUILD — vastly outnumbered opponents of the plan, including many members of Develop, Don’t Destroy Brooklyn. After six long years of public hearings and court fights, both camps had plenty to say about each other: supporters of the project tarring opponents as effete elites and opponents claiming supporters were either paid for their participation or naïve. Hear from both sides after the jump.
August 9, 2009 City Politics, Real Estate, The Locals
As I lit my cigarette and Man in the Mirror wafted through the air, screams burst from the pedestrians standing on the opposite side of Joralemon Street. A hooded man in tattered rags with a dirt-encrusted face had emerged from the Borough Hall subway station with the intention of spooking the civilians.
July 3, 2009 Brooklyn Beats, Classic, Culture, Music ProfilesIf the young hedonists of Brooklyn could have a cheerleader – one that works his mysticism in the form of a Marty Markowitz – it’s Mike Edison.
May 28, 2009 Brooklyn Beats, Classic, Music Profiles“The frank depiction of anti-Semitism on the part of ostensibly sympathetic characters can make watching it an unsettling experience for modern audiences. Here the play’s religious overtones are almost entirely obliterated,” New York Times Theater critic Charles Isherwood wrote of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, which runs at the Brooklyn Academy of Music through Sunday.
May 15, 2009 Classic, Culture, Night/Life, The Locals, Theater
Don’t call Theophilus London a rapper. He’s a pop artist.
May 13, 2009 Brooklyn Beats, Classic, Music ProfilesLike the weather on a recent Thursday, the building at 542 St. Mark’s Avenue in Crown Heights couldn’t decide whether to be one thing or another.
May 12, 2009 Art n' About, Classic, Real Estate, The Art
At WNYC’s new Jerome L. Greene Performance Space today, on the ground level of their new headquarters on Varick Street, Rosie Perez moderated a panel called The Places that Bind: Examining Preservation and Culture in a Changing City.
May 7, 2009 City Politics, Classic, Real Estate
“We’re just going to do it,” said Kris Graves, sitting on an ottoman in the center of Kris Graves Projects, his new eponymous Dumbo gallery. “Fuck it.”
It was a recent Sunday afternoon and Mr. Graves, 26, was explaining the sentiment he felt when he and his cousin Gravelle Pierre, 29, decided to open the gallery. It’s a sentiment that seems to have pervaded Brooklyn’s creative class as of late.
May 7, 2009 Art n' About, Classic, The ArtFort Greene-based author Rakesh Satyal’s debut novel, Blue Boy, is the book the young author and HarperCollins editor says he always wanted to read as a child.
April 29, 2009 Read FeaturesJust because the gross domestic product shrank at a rate of 6.1 percent recently, doesn’t mean you can’t still invest in something good. As the economy tanks, there is no shortage of auctions kicking up dollars for the arts in Brooklyn.
April 29, 2009 Art n' About, The ArtLovable, bearded bar czar Tracy Westmoreland has landed in Brooklyn. His new watering hole, Manhattans— at 769 Washington Ave. in Prospect Heights— will open on Friday, reclaiming the legacy of his former Hell’s Kitchen dive Siberia.
April 8, 2009 Bars, Night/Life, The Locals
On Thursday, I caught up with author, NYU professor and Brooklynite Clay Shirky after a talk he gave at the M Project Gallery in Tribeca. Shirky spoke on the opportunities and challenges presented by the revolution in online communication and social media tools. Afterwards, we talked about how technology has influenced the shifting demographics of Brooklyn.
March 20, 2009 Classic, Read Features, Real Estate
“WE ARE IN A RECESSION!” screamed the words from my in-box back on Nov. 16, and whether it was official yet or not, the wardrobes of Brooklyn’s 20-somethings were feeling it.
December 13, 2008 Boroughing, Culture, Fashion, The Original BTB
Recently, the door to the new and expanded Beacon’s Closet, a consignment shop now on the corner of Warren Street and Fifth Avenue in Park Slope, opened. Along with a burst of cold air came not a customer but a stink bomb.
November 21, 2008 Boroughing, Classic, Fashion, Real Estate, The Original BTB, The People
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