Update 8/27/11: Due to the impending Hurricane (!) this event has been reschedule to Saturday September 17, 2011.
Florencia emailed about a North Brooklyn scavenger hunt taking place this Saturday and it promises to be a fun experiment in exploration. Plus the starting line is at a bar, so it’s off to a good beginning in my opinion!
RAIDERS OF THE LOST mccarren PARK
You are invited to the first North Brooklyn-wide Scavenger Hunt! This event is open to the public and free! Bring your friends and get ready to collect/photograph/perform your way down the list! There will be prizes!
What: Scavenger Hunt in North Brooklyn!
When: The Hunt begins on Saturday, August 27thSeptember 17th at 3pm
Where: Meet at Berry Park (4 Berry Street at N 14th St) for the list and instructions
How: In teams of up to 4 people! (Make sure to bring a digital camera/smart phone!)
Why: Because it’s time you got to know your neighborhood even more!
For any questions, email florencia.varela86@gmail.com
As Greenpointers reported on Monday, a duo of designers on India Street is attempting to raise funds to create a community space where a parking lot is destined to go. The deadline to raise the last $2,000 of the needed $22,000 is today, at 2:00pm.
Trish Anderson and Maureen Walsh, of Domestic Construction (a design studio), live across India Street from the lot and have spear-headed the design.plot effort to create a community space with the lot for agricultural, educational, artistic and community endeavors.
A recent Greenpoint Gazettearticle chronicled the duos’ efforts to save the space from becoming a parking lot, by leasing the lot and hoping that it could be made into a community garden.
The space is located on the stretch of McGuinness Boulevard above the split off from the Pulaski Bridge, making a quieter and more secluded area than further south. But with the bridge to the west, the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant to the east, and Newtown Creek to the north, having a little oasis of green community space might mean no small amount of respite from urban pressures.
I exchanged some emails with the ladies from design.plot, who were more than eager to tell the tale.
Q. How long have you been in Greenpoint, and why is this effort important to the neighborhood?
A: We have both lived and worked in Greenpoint for about 5 years. We are both transplants. Maureen’s from Ohio and I’m from Georgia. As many people can relate, we have been living and working in an area but felt a disconnect with the amazing community that surrounded us. One thing we always missed about our lives before Brooklyn was open green space. We missed the opportunity to get dirty. When the lot entered our lives we knew we needed to save it so that all Greenpointers could have a space to explore and learn from nature.
Q. What other Greenpoint/NYC (or other) organizations have been supportive of design.plot? Have you been in contact with local groups that could use the produce?
A: We are in talks with several organizations that are in full support of the project. We are also open to any others that would want to get involved. We want to give away the food that is grown to whomever needs it. This isn’t a money making venture. We are just very passionate about building something beautiful and educational for our community to experience. We have a network of growers and farmers with shovels ready and willing to make this happen once design.plot is funded.
Q. Are there any large/corporate donors?
A: Not yet! But for us that is why the Kickstarter platform has been so inspiring. It has been amazing to meet people that support and believe in the project. The idea of design.plot being funded little by little only solidifies the sense of community that we desire.
Q. Has there been any resistance from the space’s owner? Or are they supportive?
A: Our landlord is in full support of the project. He was only turning it into a concrete lot because frankly that is the normal thing to do on an industrial street in Brooklyn. Our neighbors (which are all auto shops and metal scrap yards) are in complete support as well. We are the only artists on the block so we stand out a bit but we have never met so many friendly and open people.
Q. What kind of film screenings do you have in mind? Have any organizations/artists expressed interest? Do you also foresee the space as a music venue?
A: For October we are in talks with thegreenhorns to have a screening of their documentary [The Greenhorns]. We plan to have plans to have fully curated outdoor exhibitions. We have a ton of talented artist friends excited about the possibility of an alternative to the typical Gallery space. We hope this interest keeps growing and growing, We imagine a multitude of different performances. As long as they are positive and can serve as a respectful meeting ground.
Q. Why the August 24th deadline? Is this because the owner wants to sell NOW? Or because the project wants to beat the cold Winter? Both?
A: We are working against the clock! The lot fell in our lap just after prime planting season. We want to be able to use this fall and winter to prepare for next spring.
I am SO into cleaning out my closets lately. It’s the preparation for moving – getting rid of the old and unused that I’ve been holding onto for far too long. The best part is there are so many ways to get rid of stuff that you no longer need. You can give it away, trade it, sell it or recycle it. And who knew there was a use for those bras that were on the clearance rack three years ago that just never fit quite right, but you just hated to throw away? Well there totally is.
Adriane from Caribou Baby gave me the heads up on this month’s Bra Recycling effort. Your never worn or gently used bras will go to women in developing countries and provide deserving women bras as they transition back to self-sufficiency. They need all shapes and sizes. Remember they should be clean, in fully functioning order – no broken clasps or straps, and if they have their tags on them, keep ‘em on there – new bras are always appreciated.
What You Need To Do Before You Donate:
1. Wash your bras.
2. Fill out the Bra Recycling Form online and print it out or fill one out in person at Caribou Baby.
3. Bring your bras and forms to Caribou Baby and drop them in the donation box.
Bra Recycling
Drop off at Caribou Baby
272 Driggs Ave (between Eckford & Leonard)
This Friday you can register your bicycle for free with the 94th Precinct to enhance your chances of getting your bike back in the event that it is ever stolen.
Bicycle is marked with an identification number using an engraver. A decal is affixed to the bicycle, which is difficult to remove. In the event that it is removed “void” appears on what remains of the decal.
In the event that the bicycle is stolen and recovered, it can be traced back to the owner through I.D. number.
Friday August 26, 2011
9:00 am – 1:00 pm
94th Precinct
100 Meserole Avenue (between Manhattan and Lorimer)
Crime Prevention Officer Henry 718-383-3979
On August 19th, The Brooklyn Eaglespeculated that an empty building near the northernmost point of McGuinness Blvd in Brooklyn had been bought by a developer, Triumph Hotels, in the knowledge that the building would likely be bought by the city to be made into a homeless man’s shelter. The residents of Greenpoint – and Councilman Steve Levin, and Assemblyman Joe Lentol – have, after all, been protesting the idea for months.
Previously, Steve Levin had said of the idea that the neighborhood “as a community [is] inundated with services that we provide to the rest of the city … on a level that no other neighborhood has to do.”
Activists and politicians have pointed out that, in care for the homeless and struggling alone, Greenpoint organizations have attempted to care for the neighborhood’s already large homeless population, through: the Greenpoint Reformed Church, Most Holy Trinity, Community Board 1, and the Outreach Project – not to mention the Greenpoint Hotel and the three-quarter house on Clay Street.
On the 22nd, The Real Deal reported City Comptroller John Liu’s office as stating that, “a fair, transparent and equitable siting process” would occur.
…And speaking of sharing: a recent article on DNA Info reported on protests by UES residents against an upgrade to the already existing garbage facility at 91st Street.
Writer Amy Zimmer points out that the upgrade is “intended to reduce the burden on neighborhoods in the outer boroughs, like the South Bronx and Williamsburg and Greenpoint, Brooklyn, that have a disproportionate number of trash facilities.”
When imagining the enormous number of waste transfer vehicles rumbling around Greenpoint’s and Williamsburg’s children at all hours, the idea that “Upper East Siders are outraged by the possibility of trucks rumbling just feet away from where their kids play ball” makes one envious. (Italics all mine.)
I really like that each day they have a “theme”. Monday’s will showcase a different local business each week, Tuesday’s are for the new kids on the block, Wednesday’s all about the bartenders, Thursday’s are a local history lesson and Friday’s are for gluttonous food porn. I love it!
A fire at 43 Moultrie Street on Friday, August 19th, went to 2 alarms before being controlled by the FDNY.
On Sunday, August 21st, the building’s sole tenant, Doris Yao, was seeing to some straightening of the space while her landlord straightened up after Friday’s fire.
Yao said that the FDNY had told her the cause of the fire was still under investigation, but that it might have originated next door, at 41 Moultrie.
Yao uses the space to store ice and some supplies for her food vendor service, A-Pou’s Taste (which Yao laughingly translated from Chinese as meaning “the old woman’s taste,” as in the old woman knows how to cook) which has four locations in Manhattan, including City Hall and on the LES.
A large, full container of debris from the incident sat outside the building, to be picked up later that night.
Having relocated to a Greenpoint space from her former space in East Williamsburg, Yao jokes that she is “the bitch of the street,” as she is the only female business person on the block, which runs north/south between Meserole and Norman Avenues.
But when Yao arrived to the scene of the fire on Friday, she saw not only a mass of FDNY trucks, but all of her neighbors arrived and offered tools to help and then to clean up. “I love this neighborhood,” said Yao, who has been living in the United States for thirty years, mostly based in New York.
Yao’s landlord, while reticent to speak with me, seemed to have met Yao’s expectations in helping clean up the damages. Already a brand new roof appeared to be in place, although the VACATE sign from the Department of Buildings was still prominently affixed to the door.
Having owned A-Pou’s Taste for almost one year, Yao moved spaces to Greenpoint from East Williamsburg when she acquired the food vendor business. Yao had formerly rented space in East Williamsburg, at Meserole Ave & Bushwick Place, where she says she did not feel safe. One frightening incident occurred when a large man attempted to steal her computer from her office; when the not very tall Yao confronted the man, he claimed to be looking for a job, and Yao told him there were none available and he left. Another time, after parking her moving truck outside the East Williamsburg space for an hour, she came back to find a wheel and several parts of her engine missing.
While the cause of the fire is still unknown, Yao, her business and her Greenpoint space seem back to her liking, great news for anyone in the neighborhood who is nice enough to be a bitch of the block.
Got an email tip from reader Michelle about this final push for funds on a totally amazing project to turn an empty piece of land located on India between McGuinness and Provost into a community garden.
This is a block that definitely ain’t one of the prettiest in the neighborhood, but the ladies of Greenpoint design business Domestic Construction took it upon themselves to save the land from being paved over in concrete and made into yet another parking lot, by purchasingleasing this unused space next door to their studio. It’s now up to the community to help them raise the funds to complete it. While I can only imagine the toxins in that soil from years of industrial zoning, at some point we need to start nursing it back to health and a community garden seems like a great way to do just that.
Kickstarter projects are a dime a dozen. Everyone seems to start one for a million and one useless reasons, but there are a select few that are special and worth your hard earned dollars. This project one is one of those.
The video is adorable and even if the ladies may seem slightly stoned or something, they made a real nice save by purchasing that lot. There are too few green spaces left in Greenpoint. Check out their detailed Kickstarter page and all the cool things you can get just for donating to their cause. For just $10 you get a plant named after you!
Illustration by Dennis Rakauckas of the Village Voice
Brooklyn Brine and The Village Voice present the Second Annual Whiskey Sour Pickle Eating Contest at 8 p.m. on Saturday, August 20 at the Black Rabbit bar in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.
A cash prize will be awarded to the contestant who eats the most pickles in five minutes. To enter, sign up at the Black Rabbit by 7 p.m. on August 20th.
Second Annual Whiskey Sour Pickle Eating Contest
Saturday August 20th, 2011 at 8pm (must register for contest by 7pm) Black Rabbit
91 Greenpoint Avenue
btwn Manhattan & Franklin
