sugar factory, incomplete panorama, originally uploaded by e-liz.

This view won’t do it justice, so Gowanus Lounge urges you to check out some of the great panoramas of the Big G and Red Hook stitched together by wonderful local photog Elizabeth Weinberg, aka e-liz, and offered up on her flickr photostream. We call this entry, Panorama du Revere avant Ikea. Also, check out this Red Hook shot, this Red Hook shot and this Gowanus shot. Serves to remind GL that we need to get back to stitching all those images of the Big G and Red Hook we shot with this exact purpose in mind.

View of Lake Gowanus, originally uploaded by rsguskind.

This is the latest view of Lake Gowanus, the murky body of water formed by seeping groundwater at the future site of the Whole Foods at Third Avenue and Third Street in Gowanus. First expected this year, the opening date for Whole Foods has been pushed back until 2008 because of toxic issues on the site (and, as clearly visible, groundwater).

Whole Foods is now primed to expand toward the Gowanus Canal. As reported in Curbed, the adjacent building supply company–which Whole Foods was said to covet–and Red Hook Crusher, a building recycling facility right on the canal, are now closed.

The Brooklyn Paper has reported that Red Hook Crushers’ permit was not renewed by the Department of Sanitation. Coincidence? GL thinks not. While Sanitation says it had to do with “integrity issues,” GL believes that Whole Foods wasn’t into the idea of organic bok choy (or the cars of shoppers) coated with concrete dust.

In any case, the entire block along Third Street from Third Avenue to the Gowanus Canal is now industry- and business-free and clear for development. GL looks forward to munching on a yummy organic couscous salad on the shores of the Gowanus.

Stung by stories that controversial student artwork removed from the Brooklyn War Memorial was damaged and lost, Brooklyn College officials have told reporters that they are investigating the claims. A statement from the college reported by AP, said in part, “We take these reports seriously and are currently investigating the nature and extent of this damage.”

Students were finally allowed access to the works yesterday and say that school officials added insult to injury by allowing only one student at a time to examine the (in effect, vandalized) art, a process that lasted from 9AM-6PM.

The say much of the work–a few of which were sexual in nature and dealt with gay themes–was trashed when it was removed by college maintenance workers. Art ended up tossed in trash bags and damaged. Some can not be found. One student artist (who can not find ten drawings and most elements of a site-specific installation) says she hopes officials who decided to “employ untrained workers in the movement of artwork” are held accountable for the damage. The Department of Parks & Recreation closed the show the day after it opened, saying it was not “appropriate for families.”

GL hopes the BC “investigation” extends beyond the nature and extent of the damage, which is clearly documented in simple, multiple photos that are posted online at at blog called Plan (C)ensored. (A statement from the artists about the damage is also there.)

Perhaps the “investigation” should be handled externally and include how the decision to thuggishly remove art–whether one approves of the content or not–was made and by whom.

The surviving art will be displayed at 70 Washington in Dumbo in space donated by developer David Walentis. It is probably not going out on a limb to predict that the exhibition will draw a crowd.

Gowanus Lounge was walking down Third Street in Park Slope between Fifth Avenue and Fourth Avenue, when we wandered past two gentlemen in their fifties who were longtime residents of the neighborhood and, clearly, could recall when things along the avenues and some adjoining streets weren’t quite so affluent as they are now.

It was a simple exchange:

Guy Number One (looking at an open parking space, beyond which was visible the massive new Leviev Boymelgreen residential building on Fourth Avenue): “I’m surprised there’s a parking space.”

Guy Number Two (glum): “Yeah.”

Guy Number One (resigned): “Usually there isn’t one.”

Guy Number Two (resentful): “The place is gettin’ ruined by all those fuckin’ yuppies just lookin’ to get rich.”

Guy Number One (resigned): “Yeah.”

Remember the Brooklyn College thesis artwork at the Brooklyn War Memorial that was shut down on May 4 by Brooklyn Borough Parks Commissioner, Julius Spiegel, who called it not “appropriate for families”? Well, Brooklyn’s latest nastiness over “unsuitable” art has taken another turn with the artists alleging “shocking” damage to the removed works.

onNYTurf picks up the narrative: “The artists’ found their final thesis projects in pieces, several with damage so complete as to be irreparable, others have parts, drawing, and paintings completely missing and some found parts out on a loading dock where trash is picked up….This saga has gone from startling to incomprehensible. Students and BC faculty were deeply troubled when the Brooklyn College administration sent workers to move the artworks but did not inform students that they were doing so. All were fearful that the workers could damage the work. Those fears have now been realized but to an extent that might be shocking to even the most cynical.” (The damage to some works, apparently, can’t be determined because they can’t be found.)

The student art is now slated to be displayed at 70 Washington Street in Dumbo in space donated by developer David Walentas, assuming it can all be found and repaired. Perhaps it’s just GL’s touchy feely side, but even if you condone removing the art, don’t you think that yanking it in such a way that you commit vandalism is a line that an institution of higher education–or any government agency or private entity–ought not cross?

A couple of developments worth noting in the Atlantic Yards battle (besides this morning’s appearance of Forest City Ratner’s Jim Stuckey and Develop Don’t Destroy’s Daniel Goldstein on WNYC’s Brian Lehrer Show). First, Atlantic Yards Report carefully examines the models of the project and notes the curious possible appearance of three additional towers of up to 30 stories each, across Atlantic Avenue from the massive residential-commercial-arena site around the Atlantic Center mall. AYR also says that project architect Frank Gehry has talked about there being 20 buildings in the project (the current public total is 17).

There is much good analysis of what this implies at AYR. For our purposes, let’s simply say three more tall buildings add 15 percent to the project’s already massive 8.7 million square feet.

Meanwhile, the Park Slope Courier reports on a bill that Assem. James Brennan will be introducing in Albany to reduce the scale of Atlantic Yards by capping the project at 5.85 million square feet. The catch: Throwing hundreds of millions in public subsidies at developer Forest City Ratner in return for building less. The proposal would reduce Ratner’s payment to the MTA from $450 million to $140 million and have the state pay for about 2,000 affordable apartments on the site.

There is good news and bad news to report at Gowanus Lounge’s favorite abandoned site in Brooklyn (now that the best part of the Greenpoint Terminal Market has been dramatically dispatched by the fire gods). First, the good news: Bloc Party will be playing a McCarren Pool on July 29. Now, the bad news: Doesn’t look like the community groups that want to turn the long closed pool back into a (!!!) pool (which comes with a $40 million pricetag) will prevail anytime soon.

After paying for a $200,000 cleanup of the derelict pool for last fall’s successful and wonderful “Agora” dance presentation (cool photo of which is from swatt’s flickr photostream, Ron Delsner Presents of Clear Channel Communications snagged a contract with the city to produce McCarren Pool concerts this year. (We’re guessing the stage will be in the deep end by the old lifeguard platform?)

While rocking out in the Williamsburg/Greenpoint moonlight will be cool to some, there could be an eventual lead balloon effect among future neighbors (five lux buildings are under construction in the immediate area and more are coming).

Right now, ignoring the fact that North Brooklyn community groups seem to be losing another fight to ensure that a community asset is used for the benefit of the existing community, GL can only say: Bloc Party at McCarren Pool in July!

Killer Dogs Sign, originally uploaded by rsguskind.

We call this one, simply, “Tagged Up Guard Dog with Stickers.”

Weekends are for chilling, and so, Gowanus Lounge finds the photo to the right speaking to us.

We call this slice of streetscape, “Peace Thru Vandalism, with Buzzers.” It is from Mott Street in Nolita, which was a gritty little street before the neigborhood gained its new name and super-expensive retail moved in.

The photo is part of GL’s very large photostream on flickr.

Gowanus Lounge was amused by a reader’s reaction to our “Brooklyn Nostalgia Moment” photo of Dumbo in 2001. The words that went with the photo said, in effect, that the pace of change in some Brooklyn neighborhood is so fast that “nostalgia” can happen overnight. Here today. Gone tomorrow. This led the reader to (anonymously) write:

“Yeah, things were so much better when they were filthy and disgusting and contributing nothing to nobody. Curse those bastards who are making use of decrepit buildings and having the audacity to clean up the streets.“

GL admits to enjoying a neighborhood like Dumbo for what it was when it was a relative secret and one could go there and have that wonderful feeling of being a little alone in one’s enjoyment of it. Change, however, is inevitable. Cities that don’t change die. (To have watched the near death spiral of hundreds of American cities through the 1970s and 1980s is to know that stagnation rips out a city’s soul and that change and growth promote life.)

The issue is the nature of the change and what excessive density does to our lives. It is about allowing 40-story buildings where 10 or 15 or 20 floors make more sense. It is a development process that hinges more on political money and power than smart planning.

In a different era, when the issue was murdering communities with big public projects like highways, there were those who said that questioning the megalomaniacal plans was to oppose growth and progress. Today, those that oppose a huge or out-of-scale development are accused of wanting to preserve abandonment and decay.

The issue is not development versus no development; it is overly-dense development that overwhelms and homoginizes versus sensible growth that respects the fabric of a community.

The following is intended as commentary and has nothing to do with real starchitects and anything they have said:

Stung by criticism of Miss Brooklyn, Frank Gehry has announced that he is testing a new concept at Atlantic and Flatbush Avenue, where the “grand entrance” to the Atlantic Yards project will be located. In keeping with the real Brooklyn theme originally sought with Miss Brooklyn, the new structure is tentatively named Mr. Flatbush Avenue, although The Up Yours Building and The Yo’ I’m Mad Tall Building are also under consideration. Mr. Gehry said the organic, yet post-industrial, form of razor wire was both “very Balboa and very Brooklyn at the same time.”

Mr. Gehry said he was particularly stung by criticism of the wooden scaffolding design element in front of the former Miss Brooklyn and that he hoped the razor wire was more in keeping with the local flavor.

Atlantic Yards V.3.0 is expected shortly. (In all seriousness, another view from the street–a great number of which are available at the Atlantic Yards site–is below.)

Third Avenue and Third Street, originally uploaded by rsguskind.

A shot from Gowanus Lounge’s flickr photostream, shot at Third Avenue and Third Street in the heart of Gowanus. Jewish Press building recently purchased by Leviev Boymelgreen to make way for the Gowanus Village project is visible on the left.

Okay, it’s a cheap trick to get your attention. But, Gowanus Lounge has very mixed feelings about Frank Gehry’s naming of his big Atlantic Yards tower, Miss Brooklyn.

Yesterday, Frank O. explained how Miss Brooklyn (Could we do “Ms.,” maybe?) came to be. “When we were studying Brooklyn, we happened upon a wedding, a real Brooklyn wedding,” the architect said. “And we decided that Miss Brooklyn was a bride.”

(What is a real Brooklyn wedding? As opposed to a fake one? Is that when, like, anthropologist Margaret Mead went to Samoa and saw a real Samoan wedding?)

Gehry went on to call a nearby building, Miss Brooklyn’s “husband” and referred to another structure as the building with whom she will have an affair.

Projectile vomiting, anyone?

It’s enough that the Atlantic Yards buildings will dwarf everything around them, but do they have to be adulterers and cuckholds too?

Let’s call them damn big–really damn big–Frank Gehry buildings and be done with it.

Barely married, and GL already wants a divorce.

Some of the reaction to Atlantic Yards V2.0 is so, well, nasty, negative and vituperative, that you almost have to feel sorry for Frank Gehry. Whereas Gowanus Lounge has issues with the project’s scale, we don’t go rabid dog about the design. (What sort of structure, exactly, do those that are stunned expect from Frank Gehry?) The starchitect himself says of the design process, “We’re trying to understand what is Brooklyn, what is the body language of Brooklyn, and trying to emulate it without copying it. Copying it would trivialize it.”

The body language of Brooklyn? God help us all. (GL has used the ultimate restraint to refrain from Brooklyn Body Language jokes.) GL would settle for some Gehryian chat with people who will be living next to the thing, or looking up and staring at it.

And, then, of course, there is matter of Miss Brooklyn and Frank O.’s explanation of how the name came to be. (Insert gag reflex here.)

Surely, Gehry knows of New York’s history of eating architects for lunch and evacuating them by dinner?

Meantime, one of the more amusing events (so far, but it will be a long day) of the Deconstruct a Starchitect Olympics comes courtesy of brooklynian.com‘s impromptu Atlantic Yard’s poll, an early capture of which appears below.

So much going on locally this weekend that Boro Prez Marty Markowitz has, in the enthusiastic Markowitzian way, officially proclaimed it “What a Weekend in Brooklyn!”

Reasons include:

The Bklyn Designs show in Dumbo from May 12-14 that runs at St. Ann’s Warehouse on Water Street and other locations. The show features the work of more than 50 local designers. (GL’s photo, above, took 2nd place in the design*sponge Bklyn Designs Photo contest, but we’re not biased.)

The annual Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition cool Pier Show on Beard Street in pre-Ikea Red Hook that opens Saturday, May 13 and runs through June 18 (open weekends only, from 1PM-7PM).

With the rubble of the Greenpoint Terminal Market as a backdrop, neighborhood residents yesterday demanded an independent investigation and asked whether the inferno was set as part of a “calculated and callous plan” to speed up waterfront development. They also asked for more air quality monitoring by the EPA and DEP, and greater community scrutiny of development projects. Ironically, the morning rally was held a year to the day after the City Council approved the massive waterfront rezoning permitting high rise development in low-rise Williamsburg and Greenpoint.

“This disaster must not be swept under the carpet,” the North Brooklyn Alliance’s Dewey Thompson said. “We deserve answers to the question of how the fire was started, what the health impacts for our families are and what can be done to prevent this from ever happening again.”

There is strong community sentiment to preserve the remaining Greenpoint Terminal Market structures. Despite the massive blaze, half of the complex is still standing. Without quick action, “all of the buildings could be flattened tomorrow by their current owners,” says writer and local activist Catherine Aman.

Don’t know about you, but this new rendition of Atlantic Yards as seen from Flatbush Avenue is a real, um, eye opener.

We will avoid the temptation to get into detailed analysis of Frank Gehry’s redesign, the mass at immediate street level, etc. As one who is not averse to Gehry (and who actually finds the buidlings striking in some respects), GL would love the structures if they were in, say, Midtown.

If the intent of the new design was to help mitigate community opposition, the early read is that it has not. In fact, the impact may be the opposite. The rendition above, showing the project as seen from Flatbush Avenue and St. Mark’s in Park Slope-Prospect Heights, may indicate why some immediate neighbors and opponents are treating the new buildings like the proverbial turds floating in the punch bowl. Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn‘s Daniel Goldstein calls the new design “16 skyscrapers worth of window dressing,” comparing it to 1960s-style urban renewal with a Frank Gehry twist. To GL, calling something “urban renewal” is another way of saying, “unspeakable abomination” or “a throwback to the era when Robert Moses bulldozed neighborhoods. “

“It’s still way too big,” Goldstein says.

The press conference announcing the refried designs was noteable for excluding at least one blogger who opposes the project. (An indication of how much bloggers are irritating project backers?)

To see other renditions and assessments, go to Curbed and Atlantic Yards Report. As for this vista, well, words don’t quite it do it justice from Gowanus Lounge’s POV.

Thanks to the always excellent Daily Slope for blogging this priceless nugget of pure gold: A map of the “New Gowanus Bay” after a 9 meter rise in sea levels. Okay, so it might not be an immediate damper, so to speak, on real estate values. Long term, however, those “waterfront” developments along our beloved Big G could turn out to be Underwater Developments.

The silver lining: Waterfront property in Park Slope!!! Who knew?

Writes Daily Slope:

Before you drop $950,000 for that handyman’s special in Gowanus/G-Slope/BoCoCa East, you might want to consider the likelihood that Brooklyn’s hottest nabe may soon end up at the bottom of the Gowanus canal.

The Google Maps/Global Warming mashup (just plug in the rise in sea level to determine what it will take for you to own waterfront property)comes courtesy of Alex Tingle.

Clearly Gowanus Lounge missed the, um, boat on this one.

Brace yourselves. The latest Frank Gehry designs for Atlantic Yards were revealed earlier. To the right is the latest vision for the megablock at Atlantic and Flatbush, already posted at Curbed and at Atlantic Yards Report–and within a matter of minutes, probably at interested sites and news organizations all over the country. AYR’s Norman Oder also reported earlier that Forest City Ratner banned him from the press conference at which Mr. Gehry showed the new designs, apparently saying they would only allow reporters with “valid press credentials.” Others had to apply to FCR for admission. One supposes that that is their right, but GL thinks it rather exudes a stench of insecurity, if not a desire to silence those who might question the project.

It’s still more than a month away, but Gowanus Lounge was excited to find that Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn will be presenting the First Annual Brooklyn Blog Festival 2006 on June 22 at 8 p.m. at the Old Stone House, located between Fifth Avenue and Fourth Avenue, between 3rd and 4th Streets in Park Slope.

The Brooklyn Blog Fest will feature all of GL’s favorites: A Brooklyn Life, Daily Slope, Joe’s NYC, Design Sponge, Brownstoner, Callalillie, Lost and Frowned and, of course, OTBKB. There will be readings and awards and, no doubt, numerous blogs about the event. For more information, go to the Brooklyn Reading Works.

Come on, you know you want to do it. Your mom will never forget her Mother’s Day canoe trip down the bucolic South Brooklyn Seine, although the runoff from Friday’s rain could make our favorite body of water a little ripe. (The Big G gets a nice dose of sewerage when it rains because it lacks the cachet that would put an end to this environmental affront.)

You have two choices should you choose the Put Momma in the Canoe option:

The Gowanus Dredgers will be offering canoeing opportunities from 10AM-2PM on Sunday, May 14. A reservation form is available at their site in case you don’t want to risk spoiling mom’s special day.

Proteus Gowanus, the gallery space at Union and Nevins, is offering a lesson in the Greek alphabet, Greek hors d’oeuvres for lunch and a 15-30 minute canoe exploration of the Big G with a Dredger. The event, which runs from Noon-2PM, is $40 per person. Email info@proteusgowanus.com or call 718.243-1572 for reservations.

This Mother’s Day, put momma in the boat!!!

The entire issue of neighborhood names and identities–acronyms like BoCoCa aside–is vexing, especially in a hood like Gowanus, which has no officially recognized boundaries. There is an entire thread on the Park Slope Message Board devoted to answering the question: “My New Apt.–Do I live in Park Slope?”

“It’s on 7th street between 3rd and 4th avenue,” the writer says. “Technically, where the hell am I? Park Slope? Gowanus? Park Glowanuspe? It’s the 11215 area code, I know that.”

The writer notes a typical Gowanus streetscape: “There’s a cab company nearby…And a BP gas station. A spiffy-looking laundromat…On my block there’s a few average-looking buildings…one brand new luxury co-op building which really seems out of place (it has a website and info on a big billboard outside it, which I can’t remember), and a big warehouse takes up several lots on the northwest part of the block, trucks going in and out. It’s a pretty eclectic little place.”

Although the area could be annexed to Park Slope by real estate brokers at any moment or gain an entirely new neighborhood name, popular opinion says that Fourth Avenue (both sides) is the dividing line between the Slope and Gowanus.

The simplest rule of thumb, in the words of one writer: “If you are walking on level ground, it’s not the slope.”

First, news today that David Bowie will be curating a High Line music festival in May and doing a free concert, his first NYC show since 2003. Then, the early lineup for the Siren Festival in Coney Island. What more could one want in six hours? The early line up for the July 15 Siren Festival, which is sponsored by the Village Voice:

Stars
Tapes ‘N Tapes
The Stills
Art Brut
The Cribs
Celebration
She Wants Revenge

The festival, which happens next to the Cyclone, draws about 100,000 people. More artists to be added between now and July.

Gowanus Lounge has been spending some time in Curbed’s neighborhood. Linkages to GL’s Curbed blog items below:

· Meet the Newest Brooklyn Neighborhood: DUGO
· Greenpoint Inferno Silver Lining: Fire Sale!
· Storefront Rentals on Smith Street: Still Hipster?
· Is the Greenpoint Oil Spill Headed for LIC?
· Atlantic Yards PM Update: Ratner Model Calls Experience “Nightmarish”

The photo to the right is from my flickr photostream. It is another shot of the “Fire Sale” sign at the furniture store on West Street in one of the surviving Greenpoint Terminal Market buildings.