Red Hook Has Officially Arrived Update: Time Out New York Proclaims it So

With all the Red Hook publicity in recent weeks, we were still surprised to find the nabe on the cover of this week's Time Out New York, along with the blazing headline, Red Hook Has Arrived. First, the Washington Post deemed it so. Then, the NY Post proclaimed it. And, now, the Bible of entertainment and recreation.

One article details "27 Reasons" to visit Red Hook. Another posts 10 more ways to "Get Hooked." The story does note Red Hook's isolation from mass transit, and says:

Otherwise, Red Hook might be the new Williamsburg, awash in tapas bars and sleek boutiques. Yet for the past 50 years, the neighborhood has maintained its independence and distinct identity, a down-on-its-luck but scrappy pen-insula isolated from the rest of Brooklyn. Now change is finally sweeping the small quarter. Visitors have long made the trek to drink at Sunny’s and Lillie’s, two nocturnal outposts of good cheer (the latter was closed at press time, at least temporarily), but the area is becoming a destination for inventive bistro cuisine, not to mention art shows, live music, readings, theater and the thriving Red Hook Waterfront Arts Festival. In April, cruise ships began docking at a newly built terminal. A 52,000-square-foot Fairway supermarket opened on the waterfront in mid-May, and a giant Ikea store may arrive by 2008.

Good thing the NYPD did that humongous drug bust a few weeks ago in the Red Hook Houses. (All this hipness might not go well with the crack vials on the ground on Van Brundt Street.)

Okay, enough party pooping. For now, we will resist other unpleasant urges, like opining more on the awfulness of Ikea and simply say, check out the rest of the story, or just get on that B61 and get to the Hook (cool Time Out map below).