Bushwick’s Former Brewery Basin Is Being Radically Reimagined

Hot on the heels of the new “Bushwick-inspired” hotel, a quiet corner of the neighborhood is about to get a futuristic makeover. Just take a look at the ODA New York-designed building coming to 10 Montieth, part of the old Rheingold Brewery property. When it opens, residents will be able to skate right across the street to their jobs at a slick new office building coming to the area, 95 Evergreen. 

Ten Montieth, owned by the Rabsky Group, is poised to be a game-changer in a neighborhood where the residential stock mainly consists of two and three-family row houses and public housing towers. It boasts 500 one, two and three-bedroom apartment units and 9,000 square feet of retail space on the bottom.

The glassy design is also a departure from the warehouses typical of the neighborhood. ODA New York’s buildings sometimes get a bad rap for being boxy, but this building is focused on offering the maximum amount of green space. (Apparently if there aren’t enough parks in North Brooklyn, ODA New York will just bring the park to the tenants.) Fifty percent of the apartments have some sort of private terrace and there’s also a wraparound rooftop deck and an inner courtyard.

Eran Chen of ODA New York says he is on mission to inject nature and green spaces into city living. “The current wave of urban renewal in Bushwick gives us not only the opportunity but the responsibility to adjust old molds of living to our current ways of life,” he said in an email. Hmm…but if there’s no more calling city life quits and moving to the suburbs for a backyard when kids come along, does that mean Bushwick could be headed for stroller central?

In addition to parks space, there’ll be a running and hiking course, little farming areas, barbecues, a fire pit, and a cross-training facility. It’s safe to say those amenities will come at a price, though it’s uncertain how steep that price will be, since the sales office hasn’t opened yet.

For those who’ll have to hustle for these perks, a new office building, 95 Evergreen, is going up only a few blocks away. The former Schlitz brewery building, refurbished with beautiful open floor offices and floor-to-ceiling windows, seems to be gunning for companies at the nexus of creativity and capitalism– marketing, design, tech and the like. The 160,000-square-foot space, owned by Hornig Capital Partners, Savanna and Chelsea Village Associates will also include a roof deck. (Can’t get enough of those private outdoor spaces.)

Check out the epically hipsterific promo video from 95 Evergreen, below. Tell-tale signs of the modern yuppie? They’re all here.

But the feeling that “one of these things is not like the other” is pretty glaring for those who already live in the neighborhood, as this snap from a resident across the street shows:

They’re going to build this on #Bushwick Ave across from my spot sorta and next to #BushwickHouses- in the summer 1996 @jeru_thedamaja was on #Hot97 and talked about tour buses going through the hood. Look at this picture. These ppl don’t look LIKE #US- Black Red Tan Green Yellow Brown #NEWYORKERS- I always remember what the Damaja said these days. Especially since most of us are being displaced to the South. When we move down, they move up, and well, Jackson Mississippi, Louisiana, etc-

A photo posted by Deep And Ben Boogz (@2hungrybros) on Feb 10, 2016 at 9:59pm PST

He’s right that there’s been a lot of discomfort and protests surrounding the changing real estate landscape. It’ll be interesting to see who actually ends up moving into 10 Montieth, since there’s been a bit of haziness surrounding the affordable housing component.

The site, pretty much a vacant lot, was originally bought by Reade Property Group in the early 2000s. In 2013 Reade pushed to rezone it to residential and, in exchange, made non-binding commitments to the community to include 30 percent affordable housing, a space for a community group to develop low-income senior housing, and money for things like anti-displacement work and jobs training. 

When the Rabsky group bought it in 2014, some of those commitments seemed less stable. The affordable housing was technically optional (one reason the district’s City Council member Antonio Reynoso and his colleagues are currently considering a mandatory affordable housing policy for new buildings) and since Rabsky still hasn’t officially committed to the affordable housing component, there’s a lot of tension surrounding whether or not it will be included in the final plans.

A PR rep for ODA New Yorks’ PR firm said there would be 400 market-rate units and 100 affordable (in other words, we’re looking at 20 percent, not 30, but things could change). Reps from Council Member Antonio Reynoso’s office said they are continuing to advocate that the original commitments be honored. Either way it’s unlikely many of the units would be designated for low-income earners already living in the area, where the median income is $33,933.