More Than 100 Bars Could Open In Williamsburg Soon
The number one complaint you always hear about Williamsburg and Greenpoint is that there aren’t enough bars. There just isn’t any kind of a nightlife scene, right? It’s always so dead on the weekends. Oh. Wait. That’s not true at all! Well, but soon, it’s going to be even less true, because Community Board 1 (which covers Williamsburg and Greenpoint) has just received liquor license applications from 106 businesses. That’s the equivalent of, like, five bars on every block. Ok, not quite, but still. That’s a lot of bars!
DNAInfo reports that while some of the applications are just license renewals (required every few years), applications also “include 37 brand-new licenses…[and] 10 alterations (like when a bar adds liquor to a beer and wine menu).” So who exactly is applying for a new license? Well, “among the applicants for new licenses is the chain Urban Outfitters, which is seeking to sell booze in its clothing store opening on North Sixth Street and postponed its application from May.” Yeah, shopping drunk at Urban Outfitters sounds like a great idea. Shopping drunk at Urban Outfitters is actually pretty much how I spent many a high school weekend, or, I guess more accurately, I was shopping hungover, but sometimes I was actually still drunk. All I’ve got to say about that is there were some questionable decisions made when it came to body jewelry.
Anyway. Other businesses applying for licenses include “barber shop-bar hybrid the Blind Barber…Our Wicked Lady (to be opened by former Brooklyn Bowl managers), the bakery Charlotte Patisserie (looking to add beer and wine to their pastry and sandwich menu), a new Korean eatery called Dotory, and a new bar opened by the owners of North Williamsburg’s 4th Down Sports Bar.”
I feel like it would be a little disingenuous to get really worked up about this or feel much more than weary resignation. Expressing shock that new bars are opening in North Brooklyn is a little like claiming to be surprised at rising Brooklyn rents. You’d have to have had your head buried in the sand for the last few years not to see which way things were going. And I guess it could be worse, right? All those bars could be banks! If there’s one thing I know, it’s that bars are still better than banks.
Follow Kristin Iversen on twitter @kmiversen
