Is Bushwick Getting A Hipster Mall?!
Could it be? Could it really be? Could my one complaint about Bushwick (other than hideous lack of vegetation) — that there is no place for me to get my ears pierced and buy 5-for-$25 Christmas-themed underwear and devour samples of Auntie Anne’s and pick up some new cucumber melon lotion and go into Hot Topic “as a joke” with my one goth friend, all under one roof — finally be addressed? Are we truly getting a mall?
Perhaps. The Observer reports today that North Development Corp. has purchased an 80,000-square-foot space across the street from the Morgan L train stop on 82 Bogart Street for $12.5 million, with plans of turning it into a “sprawling nightlife, retail and artist gallery complex.”
“Think a grittier Chelsea market,” said Andrew Clemens of Massey Knakal, the realty firm in charge of marketing the space. “Grittier” sort of implies that there’s anything gritty about the Chelsea Market to begin with, but that is neither here nor there. In addition to a possible movie theater and music venue, owners are considering including studio space for artists on the second floor. I don’t know how anyone could ever get any work done with a mall right below them or afford planned rents that are at least three times more expensive than anywhere else in the neighborhood, but again, neither here nor there.
“I think there is a demand for these types of venues,” Clemens explained, “but again, I think it’s going to have to be a grittier kind of scene, and this is going to be something that caters to the crowd that’s already out there … that kind of hip, hipster, art scene.”
Hey guys, I think that’s us! Also, it’s funny this came up, since the area with all those restaurants around the Morgan stop is sort of known unofficially to no one but myself as “The Food Court.” Gosh, this is feeling like such a good fit already! I will say literally anything you want me to say if you will please, please bring a mall to my neighborhood.
Follow Virginia K. Smith on Twitter @vksmith.
