2. The Brooklyn Paper / Tom Callan
Cheers: Hostess Alexia Scott at Cafe
Shane.
The Brooklyn Paper / Bess Adler
Finding a ‘Way’: Andy Heidel is still
building Way Station, his Washington
Avenue music venue.
April 23, 2009 / GO Brooklyn / Prospect Heights / Brooklyn Nightlife
By George! Washington Avenue is making a comeback
By Shane Kite
for The Brooklyn Paper
Ken Crichlow remembers when the drug of choice on Washington Avenue was crack cocaine, not microbrews served in weird
tall beakers with wooden stands.
Crichlow was marking changes in the neighborhood at craft-beer- (and dog-) friendly Washington Commons, one of at least
four new saloons which will have opened on the eastern border of Prospect Heights by summer’s end.
Way Station, another bar expected in mid-August, will include a performance space; and the Flying Monkey expects to turn on
its taps in July — both joining Tracy Westmoreland’s “The Manhattans,” which opened last week.
The new spots look to transform the budding strip between Eastern Parkway and Atlantic Avenue, already lined with
restaurants offering cuisine from Barbados to Bangkok, into a true nightlife destination.
No, Washington is no in imminent danger of becoming “the new Ludlow,” as the Brownstoner half-seriously dubbed the street.
But it may in fact be turning into the new Vanderbilt, Prospect Heights’ more developed, “scenester” avenue to the west.
Despite always being the gateway to the Brooklyn Museum and Botanic Garden, Washington’s evolution from bleak to sleek
began about five years ago, with the first wave of new restaurants like Café Shane, a diner-cum-lounge that serves breakfast,
lunch and dinner; and the Islands, a Jamaican jerk chicken favorite. Before that, the area was a “dead zone,” according to
Crichlow.
“It was a no man’s land,” said the Park Place resident. “They used to call it ‘Ghost Town.’ I remember staying in my grandmother’s house in the summer of 1981
and counting gunshots to go to sleep at night. They seemed to come from either avenue — bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. When I moved here in 1996, I’d see these
German exchange students walking across Washington and think: ‘They better have Uzis.’”
Crichlow says that the street is still lively — but this time he means lively in a good way: “It’s amazing: We’re back from the dead.”
Multiple restaurants followed, including Gen, which boasts a legendary salmon citrus roll; Thai joint Udom; and Ginger Root, a Caribbean boite and caterer that
offers fresh baked goods (including great carrot cake) from Guyana-born owner Lyra Petrie.
Another all-day, eclectic menu was added to the avenue in December when the upscale, but comfortable, Ortine opened.
The airy and spacious back courtyard of Washington Commons attracted Tosca Giamatti, a food consultant who lives on Washington and Gates in Clinton Hill, to
head down south on the avenue on a recent spring day.
“There are no bars opening up [north] of Atlantic on Washington,” said Giamatti, explaining her presence, as she was waiting for friends to arrive for happy hour.
“A great outdoor space — that’s definitely something that’s lacking in Fort Greene and Clinton Hill.”
Reuben Kleiner, a cinematographer who lives on Park Place between Washington and Classon, said that when he first moved to Prospect Heights six months ago,
the avenue was still dominated by “a lot of barbershops.”