brooklyn spaces – a compendium of brooklyn culture & creativity

PUBLISHED TODAY! Brooklyn Spaces: 50 Hubs of Culture & Creativity

oriana on 19 May ’15

My darling dears, today is the day: Brooklyn Spaces is officially a book.

It’s available from Monacelli as a paperback and from Thought Catalog as an ebook. It’s on Amazon (discounted, natch), and hopefully it’s at your local bookstore—if it isn’t, please ask!

All the buy links and all the press and all the news is on my book page here. And don’t forget I’m throwing a great big crazy book launch party on May 30th!

I’ve been working on this project since the beginning of 2010, so this is a pretty huge day. Thank you all for sticking with me, and for loving this crazy borough as much as I do.

Yay Brooklyn!

chicken hut

oriana on 18 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it. This is the last one—the book is out tomorrow!]

neighborhood: bed-stuy | space type: living space | active since: 2000 | links: n/a

In a Brooklyn that gets more sanitized every day, there are still a few wild holdouts, and the Chicken Hut is one of the last men standing. “This is our reckless abandon studio,” says Greg H., who started the space with fellow woodworker JPL in the attic of what was then a working feather-processing factory. “It’s our home and the place where we’ve done every crazy fucking thing we’ve ever thought of.”

Chicken Hut bedroom [pic by Alix Piorun]

For fifteen years the Hut has been home to a revolving cast of more than 80 artists, builders, and renegade makers, from puppeteers to sculptors to luthiers. The space serves as an archive of their creations: robotic aliens, giant rubber sea creatures, and papier-mâché animal heads. Over the years the space has hosted art salons and open studios, as well as fundraisers for fellow artists, like Swoon and the Swimming Cities crew. And then there are the bikes. Chicken Hut is the unofficial clubhouse for the New York chapter of the mutant-bike-building group Black Label Bike Club. They’re also responsible for the annual freak-bike bacchanal Bike Kill, one of the craziest street parties of the year since 2002.

Chicken Hut founder Greg H. at Bike Kill 2014 [pic by Alix Piorun]

The Hut is also notorious for its parties—the crew throws a half-dozen jubilantly anarchic bashes each year, and each event contains many worlds: a dance floor helmed by housemate DJ Dirtyfinger here, a thrash metal band playing over there, a dirty marionette show down the hall, and a barbecue on the roof—with some 600 people bouncing back and forth among them.

Filthy Savage plays a wild party [pic by Walter Wlodarczyk]

The Chicken Hut is one of the longest-running underground outposts left in Brooklyn, a boisterous patched-together family that feels increasingly out of place amid the neighborhood’s myriad new condos and buttoned-up populous. The residents are currently in loft-law proceedings, and if they win, the building will be brought up to residential code and they’ll be granted the right to stay. “If I can’t live in this place, there’s no way I would stay in this city,” Greg says. “The grit and character this city is globally renowned for is just gone.”

Want to learn more about the Chicken Hut, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

genspace

oriana on 17 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: downtown brooklyn | space type: community biolab | active since: 2010 | links: website, facebook, twitter

There’s a lot more to DIY in Brooklyn than underground music shows and bike-powered washing machines. Genspace, the first-ever nonprofit community biotech laboratory, aims to demystify scientific experimentation. “Members are free to experiment with whatever they want, as long as it follows biosafety guidelines,” says molecular biologist Dr. Ellen Jorgensen, the Executive Director and cofounder of the space. “It doesn’t have to make money; it doesn’t even have to make sense. This is a truly innovative space.”

pix by Kit Crenshaw

Housed in a corner of the huge old Metropolitan Exchange building, the lab, which is compatible with CDC’s Biosafety Level 1 standards, is constructed from salvaged glass doors and metal restaurant counters, and most of the equipment was donated or bought secondhand. Genspace members are working on a range of open-source projects, from liquid-handling robots to super-hardy plants that can survive on other planets. The space also hosts talks, workshops, and classes to engage people who are new to scientific experimentation. “Doing this has really restored my delight in my field,” Ellen says. “Watching people realize how awesome science is—that’s very uplifting.”

Want to learn more about Genspace, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

mas house

oriana on 16 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: bed-stuy | space type: communal living | active: 2009–2015 | links: n/a

“We’re trying to make this a better city, a more livable city, together,” says Rebekah S., one of a dozen anarchist-focused denizens of MAs House, a close-knit community that supported a range of radical ideals like mutual aid, anti-authoritarianism, environmental and social justice, freeganism, and gender and sexual parity. Residents were very involved in the Occupy Wall Street movement, Mayday actions, and the People’s Climate March. Environmental-justice and anticapitalism activists working on projects like Bushwick City Farm, Time’s Up, the 123 Community Center, and the Brooklyn Free Store have lived there. Residents have distributed leftist magazines on cargo bikes, conducted anarchist study groups and prisoner letter-writing campaigns, and provided jail support for arrested protestors. They also hosted art shows, film screenings, and concerts, often to support progressive causes.

pix by Kit Crenshaw

“You can feed a lot more people with a lot less money, time, and energy if you make one big pot of food together, rather than a bunch of individual meals,” says Laurel L., who started the space. “The whole really is stronger than the sum of its parts, and it’s very inspiring to be one of those parts.”

Unfortunately, due to increasingly aggressive tactics by the landlord, the MAs denizens were evicted in early 2015, scattering to several other activist, anarchist, and communally focused living spaces across Brooklyn—although they are still fighting for the right to reclaim their home.

Want to learn more about MAs House, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

house of collection

oriana on 14 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: williamsburg | space type: home | active since: 1989 | links: facebook

“The ‘collection’ in House of Collection is both a noun and a verb,” says Paige, a bookkeeper and belly dancer, who has called this refurbished bookbinding factory home since 1989. “We see collecting as a practice, a pastime, and an approach to the world.” In this marvelous jumble, there is as much appreciation and reverence shown to a cluster of rusted gardening tools as to the antique Chickering & Sons piano that Paige’s partner Ahnika inherited from her great-uncle. “The goal is to honor something for what it is, as well as for the value of all the stories that went into it,” says Ahnika.

pix by Patricia Malfitano and Kit Crenshaw

Paige and Ahnika have collections of taxidermy, kitchen utensils, postcards, figurines, Easter eggs, toys, hats, trunks, even plants, of which they have more than 100. There’s an antique hip-replacement piece, which inspired Paige’s original name for the space: The Hip Joint. There are tiny glass bottles pried out of the sands of Dead Horse Bay, earrings Paige made from discarded crack vials she found in the neighborhood, fake greenery from an early-1990s party at the Williamsburg Immersionist warehouse Old Dutch Mustard Factory. There’s a box of nails from one of Brooklyn’s great lost treasures, the outsider art sculpture Broken Angel House.

Something else Paige and Ahnika collect is intensely creative people, using their home as a platform to showcase and celebrate the talents of their friends, from St. Eve’s Elixirs to the Schlep Sisters. They’ve hosted Burning Man fundraisers, daylong draw-a-thons, spoken word celebrations, fire spinning, belly-dancing, magic rituals, art salons, and sacred circles. Amanda Palmer and Kai Altair have shot music videos, and the Science Channel show Oddities has filmed a segment there. For the impetuous traveler, a room in the loft is available on AirB&B.

Want to learn more about House of Collection, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

fivemyles

oriana on 14 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: crown heights | space type: gallery | active since: 1999 | links: website, facebook, twitter

“Everyone in the neighborhood knows, if you need something, come to FiveMyles,” says Hanne Tierney, founder and artistic director of the Crown Heights gallery, performance venue, and community gathering space. Hanne opened the 1,500-square-foot nonprofit gallery, which is dedicated to showcasing the work of emerging, under-represented, and minority artists, in a former garage in 1999. FiveMyles presents six formal exhibitions each year, and close to half the artists shown are African American. “We’ve always stood with Africa, East Africa in particular,” Hanne says. “And it’s very exciting for the kids in the neighborhood to see contemporary work from Africa.

pix by Maximus Comissar

This year, a 172-unit luxury condo will open two doors down from FiveMyles, which Hanne fears could mark the end for the community. But she continues to fight for her neighbors: screening documentaries, hosting talks, writing letters to Albany about police harassment, and, of course, curating more and more exhibits, showing the work of more and more artists. “Hanne is so important to this community,” says Francelle Jones, whose work has been featured in the gallery. “She brings people together, and she allows people who live in this neighborhood to feel as though they’re still part of something. That’s so important.”

Want to learn more about FiceMyles, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

royal palms shuffleboard club

oriana on 12 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: gowanus | space type: recreation | active since: 2013 | links: website, facebook, twitter

As soon as Royal Palms owners Ashley and Jonathan walked into a former die-cutting factory on the Gowanus Canal, they knew they had to make the shuffleboard club they’d dreamed about. “We just plunked down our life savings and started figuring out how to make it happen,” Ashley says. They worked on it for two years, spending a long time raising money, including a Kickstarter campaign for the actual courts, which raised more than twice its goal. “That gave us a lot of confidence,” Jonathan says. “It showed us how many people were excited to support this idea, to make our passion project their passion project.”

pix by Alix Piorun

As they’d hoped, the somewhat archaic game, long relegated to retirement homes and cruise ships, is doing swimmingly in Brooklyn. It’s the perfect intersection of nostalgia, novelty, and challenge, plus it’s a very social game that you can play with a drink in your hand. “Shuffleboard takes a minute to learn but a lifetime to master,” says Ashley. “It’s hard to be very, very good, but it’s also hard to be very, very bad.”

Want to learn more about Royal Palms, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

the spectrum

oriana on 11 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: east williamsburg | space type: performance venue | active since: 2011 | links: facebook

In late 2011, several queer community and collective living spaces were all shuttered in a row—the most high-profile being Mx. Justin Vivian Bond‘s House of Whimsy in the East Village. Artist Gage of the Boone and Mx. Bond’s former roommate Nicholas were looking to start a new space for queer and queer-friendly artists to gather and present their work, and they found what would become the Spectrum tucked behind a cheap diner in East Williamsburg. A former aerobics studio and after-hours bar, the space was painted black, walled with mirrors, and adorned with a stripper pole and two disco balls. “It was grimy and sleazy,” Gage says, “but also so weird and beautiful.”

photo by Shannon Carroll

Three years on, the Spectrum has hit its stride. During the day, the space is used for dance and theatre rehearsals as well as classes, like disco yoga, queer pilates, dance, and meditation, all of which have a focus on inclusivity for any identity of body type. Then there are the nighttime events, showcasing all types of art and performance. Some recurring shows include Cloud Soundz (a music showcase), Revolting Grace and Execution (performance and dance-based work), Mama Said Sparkle! (performance art), Dick-tionary (poetry readings), and Ova the Rainbow, and Dizzyland (elaborately themed late-night dance parties). “I feel like this space is my radical duty, my everyday activism,” Gage says.

photo by Kit Crenshaw

Want to learn more about the Spectrum, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

coney island museum

oriana on 10 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: coney island | space type: museum & performance venue | active since: 1985 | links: website, facebook, twitter

Dick Zigun, the unofficial Mayor of Coney Island since 1984, has built an incredible legacy of promotion and preservation for his beloved neighborhood. In addition to founding the annual Mermaid Parade in 1983—which has grown to be the largest art parade in the country, with close to 800k people attending in 2014—he cofounded the nonprofit multi-arts organization Coney Island USA, which is responsible for running a vast array of programming, including the Coney Island Museum, the Coney Island Circus Sideshow, Burlesque at the Beach and the School of Burlesque, the Coney Island Film Society, the annual Congress of Curious Peoples, the Coney Island Tattoo and Motorcycles Convention, the interactive Halloween play Creepshow at the Freakshow, and on and on.

pix by Remi Pann

Housed in the historic 1917 building that once held the first of Coney’s two Childs Restaurants, the museum is as historically rich and valuable as its home. Dick fought successfully for the building to receive National Landmark status in 2010, and the museum features a wonderful array of Coney history, including funhouse mirrors (great for selfies!), old bumper cars, and a scale model of the original 1903 Luna Park.

Want to learn more about the Coney Island Museum, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!

mister rogers

oriana on 9 May ’15

[I’m counting down to the release of the Brooklyn Spaces book by doing one mini-post per day, sharing teasers of some of the places you’ll find in it.]

neighborhood: crown heights | space type: performance venue & coworking | active since: 2013 | links: website, facebook

Mister Rogers, a multimedia art and events space in a former West Indian bakery, is a relatively new addition to Crown Heights, but has already established itself as a home for creative expression and community-focused exchange. Founded by a trio of childhood friends, the goal of the space is to bring together the neighborhood’s very diverse populations through a variety of events and activities. It has also become a home for coworking and film and video production, bringing in increasingly high-level folks, from CNN to Forbes to Macaulay Culkin.

pix by Ruvi Leider

The first official Mister Rogers event was a collaboration with the Hoover Dam arts collective, which became a regular series called “For Locals, By Locals,” featuring music, comedy, dance, spoken word, and visual art presented by people who live in the neighborhood. Since then they’ve hosted everything from Baloonacy, a dance party among 3,000 LED-equipped balloons, to Psychic Spring, a queer performance party, to “What I Be,” a touring photography showcase that had been banned by its original host, Yeshiva University. “It has been so gratifying to see different types of people coming together in our space who might otherwise never even talk to each other,” said cofounder Ruvi Leider.

Want to learn more about Mister Rogers, and 49 other incredible Brooklyn Spaces? Buy the book!