Chasing The Cool

When did being a native Brooklynite become so uncool? 

Perhaps it was the umpteenth gourmet pickle shop opening in Williamsburg; or maybe it’s the abominable ode to “Brooklyn Girls” in which the artist, one Catey Shaw, makes it clear that “the whole thing about a Brooklyn girl is you don’t have to be from Brooklyn.” Or maybe it’s news features like this one in The New York Times stamping Oakland, Calif., a unique, interesting city in its own right, with the Brooklyn brand to officially seal its up-and-comer status. 

It was not always this way. Brooklyn was synonymous with cool. We are the home of Biggie (and birthplace of Tupac!), the iconic Brooklyn Dodgers, the best pizza outside of Italy, a host of actors, filmmakers, musicians and artists of varying degrees of celebrity, and a vibrant, thriving, unparalleled community of immigrants—the true lifeblood of the borough even as the city’s increasingly slanted economy forces them to live on the margins. 

I used to revel in telling people where I grew up. Being from Brooklyn gave me extra cachet when I skipped town for my rural summer camp in Bucks County, Pa., or when my family moved to suburban Maryland for five years, or even when I shipped off to college in north Philadelphia. It was the perfect icebreaker; suburban kids were fascinated by someone who had grown up in a major city (even if their perception of Brooklyn was sometimes akin to a modern-day O.K. Corral), while I could immediately relate to fellow city kids who had grown up riding subways and frequenting bodegas for 25-cent bags of Cheez Doodles. 

But many of the bodegas in Park Slope where I bought those Cheez Doodles have vanished, replaced by gourmet health food stores, cupcake shops, or whatever flavor-of-the-moment merchant decides to give it a go in a neighborhood (and city) where the only constant is turnover, as far as local businesses are concerned. The middle to upper-middle class families that populated the neighborhood have slowly been phased out, replaced by overcaffeinated helicopter parents who openly spy on the people they pay to care for their children. 

Now when people ask where I grew up, I cringe. 

My family moved to the Slope as the neighborhood was in the midst of a different kind of transformation. Park Slope is now renowned for its idyllic urban residential beauty—elegant brownstones, tree-lined streets, and proximity to the gem that is Prospect Park—but many forget that it once fell victim to the crack epidemic that engulfed the city during the late ’80s and early ’90s. 

Fifth Avenue, now a bustling commercial corridor with overpriced restaurants, was practically an open heroin marketplace, complete with shooting galleries and dealers posted at corners. Muggings were a regular occurrence; my mother had her purse stolen as she walked out of the subway at Grand Army Plaza—a stone’s throw from where the weekend farmer’s market now thrives. 

But then Koch’s and Dinkins’ New York gave way to Giuliani’s New York. Neighborhoods were cleaned up, to be sure, but at the same time the high-end, haughty urbanism previously confined to Manhattan began to emerge. 

Right before my family’s move to Maryland, a Starbucks set up shop on Seventh Avenue, several blocks away from my elementary school. My parents spoke of this imminent invasion of corporate America in a “there goes the neighborhood” tone— just as they had lamented the closing of the local bookstore (squeezed out by a forthcoming Barnes & Noble). At 7 years old, I was more concerned with the shuttering of childhood staples such as Al’s Toyland (now home to Yogurtland Park Slope) and Comics Plus (now Brooklyn Industries). 

When we returned to Park Slope in 2001 after our five-year absence, the neighborhood’s metamorphosis from crack haven to yuppie heaven was complete. The stretch of small businesses on Seventh Avenue that remain from my childhood are those lucky enough to be situated in buildings owned by their proprietors—like the Park Slope Barbershop, where I was a longtime customer—and the handful that were able to stay profitable enough to endure the soaring rents. 

Still, I had found a new haunt to distract from my now-unrecognizable backyard. A couple of blocks away from my high school in downtown Brooklyn was Fulton Mall, at the time one of my favorite shopping districts in the entire city. I often spent my free periods and after-school hours roaming up and down the strip, where cheap jewelry stores abutted exclusive sneaker spots and urban clothing outlets like Dr. Jay’s—many of which were minority-owned businesses—buying name-brand jeans, bootleg CDs, jackets, basketball shoes or what ever other vanity items I deemed essential. 

But toward the end of my high school years, a sea change was in the air near the far end of Fulton Mall: The Brooklyn Nets were coming to town, along with a taxpayer-funded arena, and accompanying office and residential buildings. Whatever feelings you hold about New York City’s newest sports team—as a lifelong Knicks fan, I find the sight of hipsters rocking black Nets fitted hats nauseating—there was no question that the accompanying development around the arena would grease the wheels of gentrification not only around Atlantic Yards but in its peripheral neighborhoods. 

Sure enough, as the clangor and din from the construction of the pod-shaped Barclays Center kept nearby residents up at night, the ripple effects of the building’s presence would confirm the worst fears of the business owners on Fulton Street. With the juice of a major sports franchise mere blocks away, the market value of the commercial sector soared and many small businesses moved elsewhere or closed their doors entirely. 

Four years after construction on the arena broke ground, a stroll down Fulton Mall is an experience barely discernible from shopping on Broadway in SoHo, give or take a few tourists. Goodbye, Beat Street Records. Hello, H&M. 

Perhaps this snapshot of my Brooklyn is nothing more than a NIMBYish trip down memory lane from a native nostalgic for a city that no longer exists. Maybe I should just go grab a microbrew in Greenpoint and embrace the borough’s diverse nightlife, burgeoning arts movement and always-solid music scene as positive by-products of this change. 

But this fabricated “cool,” while at times enjoyable, is largely ephemeral and a poor substitute for the endurance of mixed income neighborhoods, affordability and the ethnic diversity that made Brooklyn cool in the first place. 

Native Brooklynite Nick Powell is City & State’s City Hall bureau chief.