A Bed-Stuy Bartending Paradise: At Home with Natasha David and Jeremy Oertel
After living in a large Bushwick loft for eight years, bartending power couple Natasha David and Jeremy Oertel were ready for a place with doors. They looked all over Brooklyn, but settled on this fourth-floor walkup in a new building in Bed-Stuy. Though David is a partner at Nitecap on the Lower East Side and Oertel is the beverage director at Donna in Williamsburg, they describe themselves as homebodies and wanted to make their place cozy. Oertel built the bookshelves in the living room with a hidden ladder for their cat Toby to climb on, while David found the palm frond wallpaper and filled the place with knickknacks and plants. “Having the roof changes everything because in summer it’s like our living room,” she said. She grows herbs and vegetables up there, and loves to cook and entertain using dishes collected on their travels and pots and pans given to them by Oertel’s grandmother for their wedding. Their extensive collection of spirits, liqueurs, and bitters—made up of gifts from friends and bottles they’ve picked up on distillery tours—is very handy for working on beverage development and consulting from home.
All photos by Seth Caplan.