Did everyone make it through last weekend? First, the heat, then that electrical storm! We lost a tree and a few big branches on our block. Saturday made up for it, though (the fireworks did, not the heat). We caught the tall ships and the flyover formations from Red Hook, and it was genuinely great seeing so many people out for the 250th celebration. The day wrapped with watching fireworks at the Brooklyn Bridge, a properly special Brooklyn moment. Hope you caught some of it too. Onto Issue 23.

Now Open / Coming Soon — A national cookie chain lands in Cobble Hill, a coffee shop finally throws its grand opening, and a Court Street Italian market rounds out the lineup

The Big Story — National Grid takes 40 defendants to federal court over Gowanus Canal cleanup costs

Things to Do — A two-day arts festival, three comedy shows, a Sunday DJ set, and two events on the horizon

The Local — Inside the restaurant that started with one grandmother's pierogi recipe

Development Watch — A Downtown Brooklyn mega-project, the Nevins Landing lottery, and a fresh permit filing on 4th Avenue

Quick Hits — A canal-crossing race unlike anything else in the neighborhood

Crumbl Opens on Court Street
123 Court Street
Grand opening was Friday, Jul 10
The national cookie chain has landed near Cobble Hill, with its signature rotating weekly flavor menu and pink boxes. Expect a line for the first few weeks while the neighborhood works it out.

Coffeine Throws Its Grand Opening
561 4th Avenue
Grand opening Saturday, Jul 11 · 7am to 5pm
Coffeine quietly opened back in June, then decided to have the party anyway. Saturday brings free treats and a full day of service right on the Gowanus side of 4th Avenue, an easy stop whether you're headed to the canal or away from it.

A Court Street Market That Turns Browsers Into Regulars
274 Court Street
Open daily · 10am to 7pm
Tavola is the kind of Italian market that's easy to walk past and hard to leave once you're in. Panini made to order, shelves of imported pantry goods, and a small garden seating area out back for anyone who'd rather eat there than carry it home. Owner Jessica runs it with the kind of attention that makes first-timers into regulars.

National Grid has taken 40 co-defendants to federal court over who foots the bill for finishing the Gowanus Canal cleanup. The utility, which inherited its liability through its predecessor, Brooklyn Union Gas, argues it has already covered more than its fair share of Superfund costs and wants the other historically responsible parties, including the City of New York and Con Edison, to pay their share.

The EPA's own remediation of the canal's most contaminated stretch, a project estimated at $369 million, is already underway and won't wait for the lawsuit to be resolved. But the outcome could shape how the rest of the cleanup gets funded, and by whom, for years to come.

For a neighborhood whose entire redevelopment story rests on the promise of a clean canal, that's not a footnote. It's the fine print behind every glossy rendering along the water.

The cleanup itself is already years underway. The uppermost stretch of the canal, between Butler and 3rd Streets, finished dredging and capping back in the summer of 2024. The middle section, running down to Hamilton Avenue, is still under construction. The final stretch toward Gowanus Bay hasn't started. With one section still underway and the last not yet begun, the full cleanup is years from completion, and the total cost is estimated at north of $1.5 billion. National Grid's lawsuit doesn't slow any of that work down, it's a fight over who's still writing checks for it years from now. But for a neighborhood watching towers rise along a canal that isn't clean yet, that's not a small question.

Ify Nwadiwe at Bell House
149 7th Street
Saturday, Jul 11 · 7:30pm
He's been on your podcast feed and your group chat all year. Now he's on 7th Street.

Brooklyn Free Spirit Festival at iBeam
168 7th Street
Saturday and Sunday, Jul 11 to 12 · all day
Two days of workshops and performances, now in its third year. Wander in, wander out, no obligation to stay for all of it.

The Nursery: DJ Sprinkles, Frank & Tony at Public Records
233 Butler Street
Sunday, Jul 12 · 3pm
A daytime DJ set in an outdoor garden. Bring sunglasses, not an excuse.

Shane Torres: Emotionally Vulnerable and His Friends Will Eat Him Alive at Union Hall
702 Union Street
Sunday, Jul 12 · 5pm
The title tells you what you're in for. So, reportedly, do his friends.

The Moth StorySLAM at Bell House
149 7th Street
Monday, Jul 13 · 8pm
True stories, five minutes, no notes. Someone always cries. Rarely who you'd expect.

Brooklyn Book Festival's Big Author Reveal at Littlefield
635 Sackett Street
Tuesday, Jul 14 · 6pm
The festival announces its September lineup two months early, which is either confidence or impatience. Either way, you'll know before anyone else does.

Royel Otis at BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn
Lena Horne Bandshell, Prospect Park
Saturday, Jul 18 · 7:30pm
The Sydney duo went from bar gigs to a number one album in about five years, largely on the strength of a Cranberries cover that took over the internet. Free, outdoors, and worth the walk to Prospect Park.

The Ark at Powerhouse Arts
322 3rd Avenue
Through August 30 · Wed–Thu 12–7pm, Fri 12–8pm, Sat 11am–8pm, Sun 11am–5pm · Adults $18 · Students/Seniors $10–12 · Kids $5
Powerhouse Arts just launched its first major public exhibition. The Ark brings together 90 animal sculptures and installations by Kiki Smith, Maurizio Cattelan, Wangechi Mutu, and dozens of others, curated by Eric Fischl. The canal context makes it land differently here. A serious show in a neighborhood that's earned it.

The Nursery at Public Records
233 Butler Street
Recurring, Sunday afternoons through summer
Public Records turned its outdoor garden into a running series: a daytime DJ set with actual sunlight involved. The lineup changes week to week, the vibe doesn't. Consider this a standing invitation for as long as the weather holds.

Baba's Pierogies
295 3rd Avenue
Open daily · babasbk.com

Helena Fabiankovic grew up eating her grandmother Julia's pierogies, the kind made with flour-and-water dough and filled with potato and farmer's cheese, boiled then finished in butter. Julia had carried the recipe from Slovakia to Brooklyn in 1969. Helena carried it into a storefront on 3rd Avenue and put it on a menu.

She met her business partner, Robert Gardiner, at Irish Haven, their local bar, and the two started making pierogies together before deciding to open a real shop. Baba's opened on 3rd Avenue in the spring of 2015, named for Julia herself, and made a quiet promise that nothing on the menu would be a shortcut.

The traditional flavors are still the ones worth ordering first: potato and farmer's cheese, sauerkraut and mushroom, the kind of pierogi that tastes as somebody's actual grandmother made it, because one did. The American riffs, mac and cheese, bacon cheddar potato, jalapeño, are the fun part, a very old dish getting a very Brooklyn twist without losing the technique that makes the traditional ones so good.

The shop is small. The photos on the wall are of Julia. Her name is still on the menu, more than a decade after her granddaughter decided this stretch of 3rd Avenue needed a place that made pierogies the right way.

There's a second location now too, in Sunset Park, and if leaving the couch isn't in the cards, Baba's ships frozen pierogies nationwide, dry ice and all, as long as your state falls within a two-day shipping window.

The Old Macy's on Fulton Mall Is Going Vegas
Developer Dreamscape, the group behind Pier 17 at the South Street Seaport and the Rio in Las Vegas, is turning the shuttered Fulton Mall department store into a 440,000-square-foot retail and entertainment complex. Plans include flagship retailers, a food-and-beverage space, and a five-story atrium built around giant LED screens. It's not quite Gowanus, but it's big enough that we wanted to flag it.

Affordable Lottery Opens at Nevins Landing South
A housing lottery has launched for Nevins Landing South, a 17-story building at 417 Carroll Street with a total of 306 units. Of those, 80 are available through NYC Housing Connect at 40 to 100 percent of area median income, with eligible incomes ranging from roughly $37,000 to $210,000 depending on unit size and income tier. Applications are due July 28.

A New Permit Filed at 292 4th Avenue
A new building permit has been filed for a project at 292 4th Avenue in Gowanus. Filing details are thin at this stage. We'll follow up once plans are public.

Bakline's Racing the Canal (Tuesday, Jul 21 · 7:30pm)
Here's the concept: you predict your own finish time before the race starts, they take your watch and your phone, and whoever lands closest to their prediction wins, not whoever's fastest. It's a 5K from Bakline to Other Half Brewery with five bridges crossing the canal along the way, and the whole thing ends in a free pint at the finish line. This is exactly the kind of event that could only happen here.

Whether you're racing the canal or just enjoying a fantastic cocktail at the Nursery, we’ve given you plenty of excuses to get out there this week.

If something's happening out there, we want to know about it. Email, photo, neighborhood gossip — we'll take it.
[email protected].

Exploring Gowanus · Every Saturday