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Exploring Brooklyn This Winter: Places That You Must Not Miss

December 18, 2019 By John Major Filed Under: 111 Place in Brooklyn Tagged With: 111 places in brooklyn, john major

“People don’t notice whether it’s winter or summer when they’re happy,” Russian writer Anton Chekov once observed. No stranger to bitter, wintry winds and snow-draped tree branches, he may have been onto a secret that is a tonic for those sun-starved days of bleak gray skies and plummeting thermometers: winter doesn’t have to be about passively surviving so much as about actively enjoying.

Brooklynites are blessed with a wealth of opportunities to test this maxim. Whether it’s a hushed walk alone through Prospect Park past the Camperdown Elm or an amble with friends through the busy creative agora of the Artists and Fleas market in Williamsburg, getting out there is the easy part in our borough. Deciding where to go might be the hardest part.

My guidebook, 111 Places in Brooklyn That You Must Not Miss (published by Emons Velag with gorgeous photography by Ed Lefkowicz), offers the perfect starting point for your explorations. The book offers those of us who live here many ideas about how to see our home with fresh eyes. And it gives visitors the opportunity to experience Brooklyn like a local. Many old timers, for example, may not be familiar with the burgeoning array of shops popping up in Industry City along the waterfront near Sunset Park. Wandering along its series of corridors— perfect for a cold weekend day— you’ll be rewarded with creative innovators galore. Don’t miss Moore Brothers Wine Company. Specializing in small, environmentally sustainable vineyards, this is the go-to shop to find world-class wines to share with family and friends (or maybe not share at all).

Test your artistic mettle with an afternoon at the Brooklyn Art Library in Williamsburg. While there, make sure to take in a sampling of the more than 40,000 entries of The Sketchbook Project. The staff will be happy to direct you to a table of examples, where you’ll be able to marvel at the expressive imaginings from every corner of the globe. A shop in the front allows you to purchase the blank 5” x 7” sketchbooks to render your own creative offering. This activity is perfect for families, a “museum” of art that will inspire children and parents alike (teenagers too).

Finally, the cold of winter need not keep you from learning a new sport at Gotham Archery. With instruction and equipment rental available on site, this activity at an indoor range in Gowanus comes without the costly start-up costs. It’s a unique date night or evening out with friends, and the concentration required also offers terrific winter stress release. Let all those worries go the way of your arrow. Tournaments and special events will get those competitive endorphins flowing. And, if you’re looking for an additional challenge, you can also try axe-throwing!

Check out these and the other 108 of Brooklyn’s most fun and interesting places in 111 Places in Brooklyn That You Must Not Miss. You’ll feel happier all winter long, and before you know it, springtime will be upon us. Ready, set, explore!

The Sketchbook Project

An art project that draws the world

Steven Peterman, founder of The Brooklyn Art Library’s Sketchbook Project, never much cared for the gallery system. He didn’t think his work was good enough to hang on a gallery wall, but he wanted to create art anyway. It was 2006, and pay-to-participate art projects were beginning to pop up on the internet. “We wanted to do the opposite,” Peterman says. “This was about a year or so before crowdsourcing, so we really didn’t know what to call it, but we knew if everyone gets together this really cool art project could happen.”

Peterman and his collaborators quickly realized that sketchbooks could be a unique way for people to share their stories in a less pressured way. “When people are doing paintings that hang on the wall, they are intimidated about what they want to share,” he observed. “With sketchbooks, people have this sense that they can hide it away. We found that people were sharing amazing ideas.” Almost as importantly, sketchbooks provided an easy – and standard – format for people all over the world to contribute.

Forty thousand sketchbooks later, the “really cool art project” is an archive of work from artists of all ages and over 135 countries. Housed in a bright, stylish space in Williamsburg since 2009, its back table is a great place to spend some time poring through that day’s selection of books. “They run the gamut,” Peterman says, “from professional artists who use it as the chance to be free, to first-time artists who are afraid of the process but trying to get out of their comfort zone.” He notes that a portion even use their sketchbook as a way of dealing with some kind of hardship in their life.

A small shop offers the standard 5’’ x 7’’ sketchbook that must be used for all submissions, after which the book will be barcoded and shelved in the collection. For an additional fee, books are digitized and live online as well and are tagged by artist, location, medium, and theme.

Address 28 Frost Street, Brooklyn, NY 11211, +1 (718)388-7941, www.thesketchbookproject.com, hello@sketchbookproject.com

Getting there Subway to Metropolitan Avenue (G), or to Lorimer Street (L)

Hours Wed – Sun 10am – 6pm

Tip Hone your own skills by attending a Friday Night Drink and Draw Meetup session, offered regularly in Greenpoint. Each three-hour session is available for a small fee and offers an opportunity to work from a live model (www.meetup.com/greenpointfiguredrawing). Locations vary.

Moore Brothers Wine Co.

Last the difference

If you don’t know as much about wine as you’d like, the key is to have that one special wine shop, where you have a relationship with the staff and trust their recommendations. Now, imagine you had a wine shop where the owners also had that kind of special personal relationship with each of the producers whose wines line the shelves. Moore Brothers offers customers precisely that kind of knowledge base and experience. Store manager Ecco Adler notes, “We go to the vineyards and examine each part of the process. Over the years, we’ve developed personal relations based on trust with our winemakers and our customers.”

Forged over the course of more than 25 years, those personal relationships are the intangible special ingredient in every bottle. “Our producers are small vineyards committed to environmental sustainability, to the sustainability of their cultures,” Adler notes. “In many cases, these are vineyards that have been in families over several generations.” Moore Brothers is definitely doing their part to preserve these small, high-quality operations, and the relationship is well worth the effort. “We do our part to take care of their work. We ship the wines at a constant temperature, the same temperature they are stored at in the shop. This makes sure they arrive at your table just the way they were meant to be.”

Brothers Greg and David Moore bring several decades of experience pairing wine with foods as well to help you curate your next dinner party with sophistication and flair. Adler estimates that about 75 vineyards are currently represented in the shop. While the majority are from France, Germany, and Italy, a few choice selections from Argentina and California mean New World partisans will leave satisfied as well. Three or four bottles are almost always open to sample, and Moore Brothers also delivers with great care.

Address Industry City, 51 35th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11232, +1 (844)305-5023, www.store.moorebrothers.com

Getting there Subway to 36 Street (D, N, R)

Hours Mon – Fri 11am – 8pm, Sat 10am – 6pm, Sun noon – 5pm

Tip Leave plenty of time to explore the other inhabitants of the Industry City complex (www.industrycity.com), a 16-building complex that sits alongside the BQE in Sunset Park. Be sure to try Japan Village, a 20,000-square-foot food hall that offers the best in Asian cuisine.

Gotham Archery

Slings and arrows, not at an outrageous fortune

While on the outside this place may look like just another Gowanus warehouse, open the door and you might just have found the place to channel your inner Katniss Everdeen or Robin Hood. With a range that can accommodate 40 shooters aiming at targets from 5 to 20 yards in distance, Gotham Archery offers the chance to trade the daily frenzy for quiet concentration. “Each shot is an opportunity to pull back and let it all go,” general manager Megan Del Prior says, explaining the appeal of what many would see as a rural sport for urban dwellers. “All that stress, all the bad stuff… Letting it go is what archery is all about.”

An hour-long introductory lesson, easy to book through the website, is the place to begin, and it starts with 15 minutes of safety tips. As you can imagine, stance, posture, and etiquette are all essential to master from the beginning to maintain a secure environment. All of the equipment is available to borrow, so there’s no need for a hefty investment beforehand.

Bows primarily come in two types. Recurves are the long and slender “S” shaped bows, usually made of fiberglass or wood and used for Olympic archery. Compound bows tend to be a bit heavier and use a system of pulleys and cables to produce powerful, consistent shots. While you’ll be able to try them both, Megan says it’s not uncommon to have a preference. “It’s like something out of Harry Potter – usually the bow calls you. You’ll know which one’s for you by the end of the day.”

The club holds regular tournaments in which people of all sizes, shapes, and abilities can compete. Archery provides the rare chance for women and men to compete against each other, and people of different ages, too. Bored with paper targets? There’s 3D shooting on Mondays, where it’s anything from toy turkeys to velociraptors! Or, steel yourself and take a knife- or ax-throwing lesson or two.

Address 480 Baltic Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217, +1 (718)858-5060, www.got-archery.com, info@got-archery.com

Getting there Subway to Hoyt – Schermerhorn Streets (A, C), to

Atlantic Avenue – Barclays Center (D, N, R), or to Bergen Street (F, G)

Hours Mon – Fri 10am – 10pm, Sat & Sun 9am – 10pm

Tip Show off your ax-throwing skills at Kick Axe Throwing (622 Degraw Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217, www.kickaxe.com), a five-minute walk away in Gowanus.

111 Places in Brooklyn That You Should Not Miss This Fall

November 13, 2019 By John Major Filed Under: 111 Place in Brooklyn Tagged With: 111 places in brooklyn, john major

A male black-crowned night heron wading in the salt marsh at the Salt Marsh Nature Center in Brooklyn’s Marine Park.

Though springtime is so often hailed as the season of new beginnings, autumn can play much the same role. Whether it’s back to school or the workaday grind after summer’s offering of respite, relaxation, and recreation, September offers up the chance to re-enter the fray, recharged for the new challenges and opportunities that await. “Autumn is the second spring,” French author Albert Camus once wrote, the moment “when every leaf is a flower.” In other words, it’s a time when the normal and everyday can take on a new, even unexpected, beauty.

Seeing what lies near through fresh eyes is a central goal of my book, 111 Places in Brooklyn That You Must Not Miss(Emons Publishing). For this issue, I’ve chosen three chapters that offer the opportunity to do just that.

Along Flushing Avenue, the Brooklyn Navy Yard can seem like an industrial residue from another time. But step into BLDG 92, and you’ll have offers the opportunity to transform your appreciation of this space through a deeper understanding of its fascinating history. Located over three floors in the beautifully restored Marine Commandant’s House, museum exhibits tell not just the story of the ships built there and their centrality to national historical chapters, but also the men and women whose toil animated mammoth vessels like the USS Arizona.

Kings Theatre provides the opportunity to experience first-hand, in Camus’ terms, an architectural “flower.” Located along Brooklyn’s central artery, Flatbush Avenue, the theatre is living proof that age is no barrier to beauty – or vitality – with well-positioned resources and imagination. Lying dormant and in decay for decades, the historic Loew’s show palace has been beautifully preserved and renewed. A wide range of programming – including Tchaikowsky’s “Nutcracker” performed by the Moscow Ballet in early December – offers the opportunity to take in shows with the jaw-dropping beauty of the Kings as their stunning backdrop.

Finally, a visit to the Salt Marsh Nature Center, adjacent to Marine Park, provides a chance to experience the borough as the indigenous Lenape and the immigrant Dutch might have in centuries past. High grasses, tidal flows and migrating birds all add to the atmosphere. Brooklyn moves at a fast and furious pace, often causing us to focus our energies on the here-and-now as it unfolds in constantly changing constructed landscapes. How exhilarating it can be, then, to pause and take in a parcel of earth in our midst that preserves a sense of our home from another time.

Salt Marsh Birdwatching

Gold medal nature center

When most people think of the 1936 Berlin Olympics, it’s Jesse Owens who comes to mind. Only a few, however, know that the first American medal of those games came in the “Municipal Planning” portion of the “Arts” competitions: a silver medal for architect Charles Downing Lay for his redesign of the Marine Park neighborhood.

It’s true – from 1912 to 1948, athletics-inspired art and poetry were also Olympic competitions, probably inspired by the ancient Roman games. Emperor Nero added singing and poetry to the competition in 66 a.d. He won gold medals in both, no surprise to anyone.

Marine Park is home to the largest public park in Brooklyn, and more than half of its 798 acres consists of salt marshes like those that served as hunting and fishing grounds for the earliest Native American settlers. (Fire pits have been discovered that date from 800 to 1400 a.d.) Later, Dutch settlers also settled here, the marshland closely resembling the coastal plains of their homeland.

Though more than three-quarters of Jamaica Bay’s large estuary wetland has disappeared (mostly due to development in the 1950s through 1970s), the remaining 18,000 acres play host to more than 325 species of birds and 50 species of butterflies, including many migratory birds passing through on their seasonal flights.

Formed in 2000, the Salt Marsh Nature Center is one of 10 Urban Park Ranger nature centers, making it ideal as a weekend activity spot for families. Pack a camera, binoculars, and a water bottle, and head out onto one of the well-groomed trails, offering a chance to experience the fragile ecosystem close up. Ramble through the grasslands alongside briny Gerritsen Creek. Well-placed benches provide perfect viewing spots to observe the herons, cormorants, egrets, ducks, and geese as they make their way among the shallow waters, as red-winged blackbirds and marsh hawks soar overhead.

Kings Theatre

Movie palace grandeur returns to Flatbush

A magnificent vaudeville and movie palace that formed part of a traveling MGM entertainment circuit in the New York City area, the Kings Theatre opened in Flatbush on September 7, 1929 as one of the original five Loew’s “Wonder Theatres.” Changing economic fortunes for the neighborhood brought gradual decay until, in 1977, the Kings was closed and abandoned. Left to the ravages of nature and looters, the Kings lay largely neglected until 2010, when Houston-based ACE Theatrical Group, LLC was chosen to lead what eventually became a $95-million restoration project. Vintage architectural elements, including ornate plaster moldings, pink marble staircases, and the sumptuous honeycomb ceiling, have been meticulously restored and recreated, and the original pipe organ console, removed and preserved during the closure by enthusiasts, is on display.

State-of-the-art stage and sound elements installed have transformed the Kings into a 3,200-seat theatrical and musical venue without peer. Largely still undiscovered by Manhattanites, the Kings offers intimate and smartly curated concerts that will satisfy baby boomers (The Temptations, The O’Jays), Gen Xers (Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, The Pixies), and millennials (Sufjan Stevens, Bon Iver) alike. Historic “happy hour” tours offer visitors a chance to explore the Kings in more detail with a glass of wine in hand.

Just up the street, near Church Avenue, are two additional local landmarks. Erasmus Hall High School (899 – 925 Flatbush Avenue), founded in 1786, boasts a long list of notable alumni, including singers Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand, actress Mae West, opera star Beverly Sills, and chess champion Bobby Fischer. Meanwhile, the Tiffany-studio stained-glass windows of Flatbush Dutch Reformed Church (890 Flatbush), founded in 1654, commemorate the many early Dutch families who worshipped there. The landmarked Art Deco Sears building sits just behind the Kings on Bedford Avenue.

A 22,500 lb. anchor from the USS Austin at Building 92 of the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

BLDG 92

Local ships that sailed the world

The area along Brooklyn’s East River waterfront can seem to the uninitiated like a drab expanse of warehouses and docks cut off from the rest of the borough. Dubbed Vinegar Hill back in the 19th century, an allusion (in this largely Irish neighborhood) to the Battle of Vinegar Hill that was part of the Irish Rebellion, the area’s first commercial shipyards were established just after the Revolutionary War. In 1801, the US government purchased 40 acres and established shipbuilding operations that were central to the Navy for the next 160-plus years.

BLDG 92 offers a gateway to this fascinating history via a free exhibit over three floors in the restored Marine Commandant’s House. As you enter the Navy Yard through a pedestrian gate along Flushing Avenue, pause to look at this red-bricked gem originally built in 1857 and designed by Thomas U. Walter, fourth architect of the US Capitol and responsible for the central dome.

A comprehensive timeline on the exhibition’s first floor frames the Navy Yard’s history against the nation’s political and social history. Production here ebbed and flowed alongside the intermittent winds of war, and several craft help tell that story. Though built in nearby

Greenpoint, the USS Monitor, the first ironclad steamship built for the Navy fleet, was outiftted and commissioned here in 1862. Built at the Navy Yard, the USS Maine was an armored cruiser commissioned in 1895 but famously sunk during an explosion in Havana Harbor on February 15, 1898. The battleship USS Arizona, sunk in the attack on Pearl Harbor, was built in Brooklyn over a 15 month period in 1915 – 16, as was the USS Missouri, built 1941 – 44, where the treaty

to end war with Japan was signed in August 1945.

Don’t miss the third-floor displays, which tell the important story of the men and women who worked at the Navy Yard. That spirit of industry and innovation continues today with the 400 businesses now located there.

Photography by Ed Lefkowicz

111 Place in Brooklyn That You Should Not Miss This Summer

August 13, 2019 By John Major Filed Under: 111 Place in Brooklyn Tagged With: 111 places, 111 places in brooklyn, john major, summer

There’s No Place Like Brooklyn in the Summertime

If spring is about renewal and possibilities, then summer is the season when the fun is in discovering what form those visions may take. In Brooklyn, the action moves outdoors, into the sunshine and warmth, where it can be experienced with friends, family, and neighbors – or the legion of tourists from points all over the globe. We welcome them.

The borough is filled with people who arrived here from other places, pausing only to enjoy the life they found. Whether it’s celebrating any number of the world’s musical traditions at concerts at Prospect Park’s bandshell, catching up with friends in the beer garden of a neighborhood pub, or schmoozing with whomever’s next to you at the playground while the children romp, Brooklynites celebrate being alive in summer, even if we do so at our decidedly quickened pace.

This issue’s selections from my new book, 111 Places in Brooklyn That You Must Not Miss (published by Emons Verlag), each fit part of the bill. Nosh on a roti or doubles at Ali’s Trinidad in Bed-Stuy to sample a rich culinary tradition created through a Caribbean cultural fusion, all here courtesy of immigrants. Enjoy the vibrant sights and sounds of the street, which are part of the flavor too.

Or get your hands dirty volunteering alongside teen interns at the Red Hook Community Farm, located just past the ball fields and WPA-era swimming pool (also one of my 111 places, by the way). Help tend and harvest the many organic vegetables each year or the tons of compost that helps them grow.

Finally, while a visit to a cemetery may not be your first idea for some summer fun, the grounds of Green-Wood Cemetery make it a natural destination for spotting monk parakeets within the entrance’s Gothic arch, rambling on the labyrinth of roads as you seek the final resting place of Dorothy’s Wizard of Oz, or attending any of Green-Wood’s wonderful calendar of events, including many at night. None are quite so magical as “A Night at Niblo’s Garden,” a Victorian circus and picnic around the mausoleum of a great showman.

Anyway possible, get out of the house and enjoy this great borough of ours!

Niblo’s Garden

Dancing around their graves

After complaints of smells coming from Trinity Cemetery in Manhattan, Green-Wood Cemetery was created in 1838 as a rural alternative. An early version of a public park, it became a popular attraction for Victorian New Yorkers, drawing half a million visitors a year to wander its tree-lined paths. (Its popularity served as a main rationale for the later construction of Central Park.)

Modeled on Paris’ Père Lachaise Cemetery, Green-Wood’s owners marketed it as the elite address for the afterlife. The free map at the entrance will help you find the final resting places of celebrated artists Jean-Michel Basquiat and Louis Comfort Tiffany; “West Side Story” composer Leonard Bernstein and “New York, New York” lyricist Fred Ebbs; and presidential candidates Horace Greeley and DeWitt Clinton. Notorious Tammany Hall politician “Boss” Tweed, who stole $200 million from city coffers, is here with mob boss Anastasio Umberto, leader of the enforcement gang known as Murder Inc., reportedly responsible for some 400 murders, as well as “Crazy Joe” Gallo, the “little guy with steel balls” who killed him in a barber’s chair.

There are countless stories behind the tombs at Green-Wood. Perhaps none is more peculiar than that of William Niblo. An immigrant from Ireland, Niblo opened the Bank Coffee House near New York’s financial center that became the place for the New York “it” crowd to see and be seen. He then opened the wildly successful Niblo’s Garden, an open-air tavern that staged performances by lantern light, including PT Barnum’s first spectacular.

Heartbroken when his wife Martha died in 1851, Niblo built a large mausoleum near the cemetery’s picturesque Crescent Waters. For 27 years until his death, he visited her tomb almost every day, often bringing friends along for parties and picnics, a practice Green-Wood now celebrates with an annual summer soirée, featuring performers from the Bindlestiff Family Cirkus.

Address 500 25th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11232, +1 (718)210-3080, www.green-wood.com, events@green-wood.com | Getting there Subway to 25 Street (R) | Hours See website for hours, which vary for each entrance and season | Tip Across the street from the cemetery entrance, enjoy a coffee and take home a fresh loaf of bread from Baked in Brooklyn (755 5th Avenue, New York, NY 10022, www.bakedinbrooklynny.com). You can watch the bakers at work through the windows as you wait.

Red Hook Community Farm

Renewable farming and leaders sprout in Brooklyn

Created on the site of a former concrete baseball field in Red Hook, this pioneer urban farm yields more than 20,000 pounds of organically produced vegetables. Eggplant, peppers, tomatoes, beets, lettuces and three varieties of kale – these are just some of the harvest raised on this nearly three-acre plot.

Half the area is dedicated to a composting project, managed by staff from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, which supplements the compost originally provided by the city’s Department of Sanitation. The largest community composting site in the country run entirely by renewable resources, a handful of tumblers are placed near the Otsego Street entrance for the public to contribute household waste, like fruit and vegetable scraps and coffee grounds. Later, volunteers help process those contributions into usable, new, organic material (more than 200 tons annually) that gets added to the two-feet-deep raised beds where the food production takes place.

Farm operations are overseen by staff members from Added Value, an urban farming and food justice non-profit center, which has offices nearby. Focused on working with young people to cultivate knowledge about both sustainable farming and leadership skills, the group hires up to two dozen teen interns each year to work the farm after school and during the summer months. Public volunteers are always welcome, and there’s no need to register in advance. Just come prepared

for the weather and expect to get dirty. Regular drop-in opportunities offer a chance to work the garden or help with the compost.

Some produce from the garden is sold at the weekly farmers’ market each Saturday morning. Subscriptions are also available that provide weekly distributions of the wide variety of fresh produce during the harvest season.

Address 560 Columbia Street, Brooklyn, NY 11231, +1 (718)288-6752, www.added-value.org | Getting there Subway to Smith Street – 9 Street (F, G), then take bus B 57 or B 61 | Hours Fri 9am – noon, Sat 10:30am – 1pm | Tip For another beautiful garden producing fruits and vegetables, drop in on the Bedford-Stuyvesant Community Garden (95 Malcolm X Boulevard, Brooklyn, NY 11221, www.nyrp.org).

Beef roti and house-made ginger beer in Ali’s Roti, on Fulton Street in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood.

Roti at Ali’s Trinidad

A local food vendor evokes memories of faraway

While the highlight for many in Brooklyn’s vast West Indian community might be the annual New York City Caribbean Carnival Parade that occurs in late August, a multi-day bacchanal that draws several hundred thousand people annually to the streets where Crown Heights bumps up against Lefferts Garden, the rest of the year offers plenty of opportunities to celebrate their national heritage. A long history of immigration to the borough from the Caribbean islands has left Brooklyn blanketed in businesses, especially eateries, that provide reminders of home.

Ali’s Trinidad Roti Shop does its part to supply a share of those gastronomic memories. Though the landscape is crowded with shops offering roti, an Indian-style flatbread that is used to wrap around potatoes and chickpeas along with your choice of meat, Ali’s offerings stand out for their spicy blend of homey flavor. The shop is compact, and the service no-frills, but there’s a reason people wait on line. And as you wait, you’ll have time to strike up a conversation and perhaps listen to some calypso or soca.

Roti is actually a culinary legacy of the history of slavery and indentured servitude throughout the West Indies. For centuries the Caribbean was populated by enslaved African peoples forced to work on British- owned sugar cane plantations. Indentured South Asians arrived to take their place after abolition in the 1830s. They brought with them their delicious naan and paratha breads. It didn’t take long for cultural crossover to occur.

Another Ali’s Trinidad specialty is doubles (always said as a plural). Consisting of a pair of fried flat breads spiced with turmeric and filled with curried chickpeas like the Indian chana, the ones here are generously dressed with a sweet tamarind sauce or a pepper sauce. Wash it down with a ginger beer to complete the authentic island experience.

Address 1267 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, NY 11216, +1 (718)783-0316 | Getting there Subway to Franklin Avenue (C, S) | Hours Mon – Sat 11:30am – 10pm | Tip To learn more about Caribbean food culture, or to explore other international culinary traditions, visit the Museum of Food and Drink (62 Bayard Street, Brooklyn, NY 11222, www.mofad.org).

111 Places In Brooklyn That You Should Not Miss This Spring

May 8, 2019 By John Major Leave a Comment Filed Under: 111 Place in Brooklyn Tagged With: 111 places, Brooklyn, john major

111 places in Brooklyn that you must not Miss? It seems impossible to choose. A fiercely independent borough that, were it to be the separate city it was until 1898, would be competing with Chicago for third largest in the country, Brooklyn is headstrong about maintaining that individuality, despite becoming one of the most desirable destination points in the country, if not the world. The rents may have skyrocketed, but Brooklyn remains distinctly one-of-a-kind, with a rich and complex history that is tolerant of the different, the foreign, the weird.

But in my new guidebook, 111 Places in Brooklyn That You Must Not Miss (Emons Verlag), the story I felt it important to tell was of a Brooklyn that is less an undifferentiated mass— and, as a result, somewhat of an abstraction— than a collection of neighborhoods, each with its own character and history created by the people who’ve come here from all over the world. That energy is what drew me here from my small hometown in southern Ohio years ago. It’s what still drives people to come. Churning that diversity into something fresh and unique, something more than the sum of its parts, is what happens here. That is a tall order to capture.

I’ve attempted to curate an experience of our borough that will set readers on a path. It’s a path that meanders past sites like the Weeksville Heritage Center, where the story of one of the first communities of free blacks is preserved, or Pier 69, where a memorial remembers lives lost on September 11th. The journey continues to the doorstep of Brooklyn Owl, where your child can be transformed into a unicorn and “wear their magic” as they complete an in-store adventure, and Gotham Archery, where you can practice your axe-throwing form or transform into Katniss Everdeen with your bow.

In each of the next four issues, Park Slope Reader will feature three of my 111 places to provide a taste of those little known treasures, secret spots and unusual stories Brooklyn has to offer. Springtime is the theme of our first three chapters. Minutes away from Park Slope, Brooklyn Botanic Gardens provides a great setting for very welcome family days outdoors as daffodils, tulips and bluebells reveal their radiant blooms after the long gray winter. Be sure to checkout the venerable Caucasian wingnut there, which, though it sounds like a punchline, is a Brooklyn immigrant, too, arriving as a sapling in 1922 and now more than 45 feet tall. Spring is also the time for trying new things. Why not pay a visit to Jalopy Theatre and School of Music for a chance to learn to play that dusty guitar or banjo you inherited from your grandfather? Finally, spring can be a time when old things can have new life— which happens no place better than at Olly OxenFree Vintage, where a 1950s cocktail dress is ready to go on new adventures with you in it. As with all 111 places, springtime is about new beginnings. So, with book in hand, start exploring your borough like never before!

John Major, Author

Caucasian Wingnut

A Black Sea immigrant lays down roots

Pterocarya fraxinifolia, the Latin name for the Caucasian wingnut, has none of the comic value of the more common English label for this arboreal rarity. Though conjuring notions of a political extremist, the name of this immense and august tree actually identifies it as a member of the walnut family from the mountainous region between the Black and Caspian Seas where Asia butts up against Europe. The species arrived in Europe in 1782, transported by a French naturalist.

Located just north of the Rock Garden in the area alongside Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s (BBG) own goliath, characterized by its sizeable exposed root mass, is not difficult to find. Arriving from Rome as a sapling in 1922, BBG’s example now measures more than 45 feet in height and has a canopy that extends more than 60 feet (propped up on one vulnerable end), while its gnarled and knotty trunk spans 10 full feet in width. Catkins, a drooping flowering strand up to 20 inches in length, appear during the summer. A second tree, propagated from a cutting taken from this first tree, can be found near the Herb Garden.

A short walk away, just south of the Rock Garden, the Mountain Winterberry, a species from the Appalachians considerably closer to home, was one of the 12,000 plants original to the Botanic Garden when it opened in 1911. The nearby Chinese Parasol tree, so named for its large leaves that can grow to 12 inches in width, has been in residence here since 1925, a gift of the Yokohama Nursery in Japan.

For trees of a decidedly more diminutive sort, don’t miss the C.V. Starr Bonsai Museum. With over 350 specimens, about 30 of which are on display at any one time, BBG’s collection is one of the oldest and largest outside of Japan. One bonsai, a white pine, is more than 300 years old and was brought to Brooklyn from a Japanese mountainside more than 90 years ago.

Address: 990 Washington Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11225, +1 (718)623-7200, www.bbg.org | Getting there: Subway to Eastern Parkway–Brooklyn Museum (2, 3) or to Prospect Park (B, Q, S) | Hours: See website for summer, winter, and late-night hours | Tip: Inspired to do some gardening of your own? Check out Brooklyn Plantology (26 Brooklyn Terminal Market, 1510, Brooklyn, NY 11236, www.brooklynplantology.com) in Canarsie. At 20,000 square feet, this family-owned business offers a wide selection of seasonal outdoor and indoor plants, plus pots and gardening supplies.

Jalopy Theatre and School of Music

Come for the music, stay for the community

“It’s called the Jalopy for a reason,” co-founder Lynette Wiley notes. “We’re not shiny and polished. We gamble that people will be open to our teachers’ ideas. We’re willing to say, ‘Let’s see what happens.’” Luckily, what often “happens” at Jalopy, both music school and performance space, is unique, even in a borough that prides itself on creativity and diversity.

Lynette and her husband Geoff arrived from Chicago in 2005 with the dream of creating a place where people of all ages, cultures, and abilities could feel at home. Classes and workshops are mostly in the early evenings or weekends. Kids programming (Jalopy Juniors) often ends with parents and children sharing a meal together. The stage becomes a place where musicians of many ethnic groups can interact. “Often, cultural groups only play for their own communities,” Lynette adds. “We give them a chance to experience each other.”

A month’s worth of performances might feature Indian raga, Mexican ranchera, and African drumming and skiffle. Author and actor Sam Shepard occasionally used to perform in a jug band here. Spirit Family Reunion and Blind Boy Paxton have graced Jalopy’s intimate stage. Classes, which have eight students maximum, are arranged in affordable eight-week sets, focusing on how to play particular instruments (guitar, fiddle, banjo, ukulele, and mandolin). No one is too inexperienced. Workshops on subjects like vocal harmony, slide guitar, or Balkan singing are also offered regularly. A small store has refurbished instruments for sale or rent.

“Put down your phone,” Lynette says warmly. “Come in, experience something, be in a room with other people. Just that idea of being present and quiet is tonic, especially for New Yorkers. That’s an education, too.”

Address 315 Columbia Street, Brooklyn, NY 11231, +1 (718)395-3214, www.jalopytheatre.org | Getting there: Subway to Carroll Street (F, G) | Hours: See website for class and performance schedules | Tip: Quilters and knitters may want to check out nearby Brooklyn General Store (128 Union Street, Brooklyn, NY 11231, www.brooklyngeneral.com). The shop carries a great collection of fabrics and hand-dyed wools and offers classes of all sorts.

Ollly Oxen Free vintage store in Williamsburg

Olly OxenFree Vintage

Breathe new life into your old wardrobe

Olly OxenFree Vintage is a sanctuary for fashion of bygone eras. The vintage store has been open since 2012 but feels like it has been setting trends for decades. The shop has a clear love for fashion and design from the 40s through 70s with coats, kimonos, cocktail dresses, vintage tees, and full-on costumes, all carefully curated and cataloged in visually stunning ways by Suzy, the store’s owner and founder.

It is easy to get lost among the beautiful fabrics and patterns that swaddle you when you first step inside the space from the bustling sidewalk. There is not a warmer and cozier place in Brooklyn. Suzy decks out every inch of her space to provide a little universe lost in time. She encourages patrons to try on one-of-a-kind pieces that she personally hand selects with care. You can’t help but want to touch and get to know each piece of clothing and learn their stories. Suzy is knowledgeable and is more than willing and able to help visitors find pieces for events, projects, or personal collections. This is the one-stop clothing oasis of your dreams.

Fundraisers and events are always percolating at Olly OxenFree. In the front you might find vintage tees that Suzy worked with artists to adorn with “No DAPL” (No Dakota Access Pipeline), with proceeds supporting the cause. The back of the store has held fundraisers and benefit concerts for Planned Parenthood and Standing Rock, among others. Along with political and social events, Olly OxenFree hosts classes, music events, and readings. Every Sunday the space in the back is opened up for a first-come, first-served yoga class taught by an accredited yoga teacher well versed in tantra and kundalini yoga, who teaches in the city at a top studio but comes once a week for a donation-based class. This store is a must-visit, as it combines the magic of your big sister’s closet and the historical interest of a museum.

Address: 137 Montrose Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11206, +1 (347)762-5048, www.ollyoxenfreevintage.com, oofvintage@gmail.com | Getting there: Subway to Montrose Avenue (L) | Hours: Mon, Wed, Thu 11am – 8pm, Fri – Sun 11am – 7pm | Tip: Antoinette (119 Grand Street, Brooklyn, NY 11249, www.antoinettebrooklyn.com) offers a balance of old and new on its racks. Roughly 70% of their clothing stock is vintage, while 30% is the work of Brooklyn-based designers.