WHAT TO EAT, DRINK & DO — ACCORDING TO ARTISTS WE LOVE
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Check out the adult playground that is Brooklyn Crab
“Brooklyn Crab is this amazing place down in Red Hook. You need to get a group of friends, go down there. You’re gonna have drinks, you’re gonna have snacks, and you’re gonna play cornhole and other games. It’s a very cool adult playground with drinks and seafood. It’s almost where I had my kids’ second birthday, because I was like, you guys are still young enough that it’s really for us, right?
My husband and I actually went down there for a date night not too long ago, and I wish that we’d known how much fun it is, how many things there are to do there. There’s a sandbox for kids — which is great, because I can bring my kids — but there are so many things for adults to do, and the drinks aren’t cheap, but they’re not too expensive. It’s just a fun atmosphere — and a good view of the Statue of Liberty.” – Brandi Thompson
24 Reed St, (718) 643-2722, brooklyncrab.com
Get weird with it at IKEA
“As for the best place in Brooklyn, maybe in the world: IKEA. I love all IKEAs equally, except for one. The one in Red Hook, that’s the best IKEA. I visit the store from time to time and it is especially striking: being by the water and kind of isolated from everything else makes for a mystical experience. I get lost in braided silk window curtains and find pieces of myself in the drawers of my favorite dark oak wood nightstand. My skin rubs against a kaleidoscope-patterned rug that hangs vertically; with wool so thin I feel my own fingerprints. Enthralled by touch and hypnotized by the sight of the most beautiful kinetic multicolored lamp I lose my sense of self and with it the knowledge that my phone is on 1%. I am IKEA. I am the stream from the top of the mountains all the way to the sea. I am bliss. All of a sudden the flow is disrupted as a big rubber boot stomps into the water, its sound echoes through the entire forest: ‘Our store will close in fifteen minutes, please proceed to the checkout counter to complete your purchase. We’re open daily from nine thirty am to ten pm…’
I snap out of the cosmos, knowing I either swim to the ocean or the fisherman fishes me out of the river. So I choose to swim. I exit the temple, reborn.” – Assassin of Youth
Get your roll on at Red Hook Lobster
“I come from a family of food lovers. We usually give the credit to the Italian side — whether that is scientifically true is TBD, but I’m gonna keep running with it. Moreover, a gal from CT, lobster rolls have always been a family favorite. So when I moved to BK, we discovered Red Hook Lobster, and I’ve literally never even wanted to explore a lobster roll anywhere else. It reminds me a little of home, and I love to go with people and debate over Maine or Connecticut style. It’s also down in Red Hook, which is a wonderful neighborhood, on the water, near a cute lil view of the Statue of Liberty (one of those things you see and remember, ‘Holy shit! I live here!’).” – Raycee Jones
284 Van Brunt St, (718) 858-7650, redhooklobster.com
Hit the Saturday-night bluegrass jam at Sunny’s
“It’s in Red Hook, so it’s right by the water. It’s so nice.
I don’t go there as often as I want, because it’s really a late night. It goes until like four in the morning, and I’ve never been able to hang that late. But the few times I’ve gone, it makes me feel like I’m completely out of the city in this foreign paradise. It’s all these people that don’t seem like New Yorkers… in that they seem really authentic — they’re just wearing whatever the fuck they want. You know, the typical New York style is all black — which I’m wearing — but you walk in and you’re just like, who are these people? There was this one night I went and there was heat lightning across the water and there’s just this bluegrass music in the background, all these old dudes are playing mandolin and banjo… It was so cute.” – Elizabeth Wyld
253 Conover St, (718) 625-8211, sunnysredhook.com