March 15–21, 2019 Brooklyn Paper • www.BrooklynPaper.com • (718) 260-2500 AWP 11
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Extended play
Hybrid cafe, venue, bar for vinyl lovers
opening in ancient Gowanus building
Best in grow!
Craftsman makes fancy
furniture for growing pot
Woodworker Robert Pettit at his Boerum Hill shop, where he creates growing
cabinets for swanky stoners. (Right) When opened, the piece reveals a sophisticated
W.O.W.
$1,500
SAVINGS
By Kevin Duggan
Brooklyn Paper
It’s a new spin on an old
building!
A new café, bar, and performance
space called Public
Records is reportedly set to
open inside a more than century
old Gowanus building in
the coming weeks.
The hybrid business will
consist of three rooms inside
the Butler Street property,
which for decades housed
the Kings County chapter
of the American Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to
Animals, and later a guitar
shop, before the musicians
moved out last year.
One room will feature a
vegan café, with the second
serving as a venue for live performances,
and the third refashioned
as a so-called record
bar, where the owners will pour
drinks as collectors spin their
rare vinyl, according to report
by London-based culture publication
Fact magazine.
Owners of the new spot between
Nevins and Bond streets
near the end of the fetid Gowanus
Canal will welcome its
first patrons at back-to-back
concerts on March 19 and 20,
before officially opening Public
Records on March 21, according
to a post on the establishment’s
Facebook page.
The animal society moved
into the building following
its completion back in 1913,
vacating it more than six decades
later in 1979, according
to a Brownstoner report . Subsequent
tenants included two
pipe-organ businesses, DNA
Info reported , and stringed-instrument
seller RetroFret Vintage
Guitars, whose owners
moved their shop to Carroll
Gardens last September.
Bigwigs at Manhattanbased
developer Surtsey Realty
Company LLC bought the
property for $9.5 million in
A bar, café, and venue called Public Records is set to
open on Butler Street, inside the long-time former
home of the Brooklyn chapter of the American Society
for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
Photo by Kevin Duggan
2017, filing plans with the Department
of Buildings to convert
it into a restaurant, bar,
and retail venue later that year,
which the agency granted in
February, according to public
records.
The owners of Public Records
did not return requests
for comment.
By Colin Mixson
Brooklyn Paper
Talk about high design!
Horticulturists with a hankering
for harvesting weed
can do so from the comfort
of their own living
rooms — and not
their dank garages
— thanks to a local
craftsman, who
churns out growing
cabinets at a Boerum
Hill workshop that
he said are tailor
made for swanky
stoners.
“I’m trying to cater to a
niche market of luxury cannabis
consumers and growers,”
said woodworker Robert
Pettit. “I wanted to make
something that was beautiful,
really expensive, and highly
functional.”
Pettit sells his luxe weed
cabinets — which he hand
crafts out of walnut and cherry
wood, and equips with socalled
smart lights that can
be controlled from a cellphone
— for a whopping $13,500,
claiming there’s no other gardening
furniture on the market
that looks as good as it
grows.
“There are a lot of different
growing kits, tents,
cabinets, and mass
produced units, but
they’re not something
I would
ever display in my
home,” he said.
The craftsman,
who lives in Ditmas
Park, began
building his fancypants
pot cabinets two years
ago, looking to cash in as pols
in states across the country
— including Alaska, California,
Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts,
Michigan, Nevada,
Oregon, Vermont, and Washington
— voted to give constituents
the right to toke.
And after Gov. Cuomo
recently announced a package
of bills that would legalize
smoking the sticky icky
in New York State , Pettit —
who makes his living crafting
more traditional, custommade
furniture for his bougie
clientèle — hopes it won’t
be long until there’s a local
market for his cannabis cabinet,
too.
“Being in New York City, in
an urban area, you don’t have
a lot of extra bedrooms, garages,
or stuff like that,” he
said. “If you’re going to grow
here, it’s going to be grown in
your living room, so it’s gotta
be subtle, it’s gotta look nice,
but it doesn’t have to scream,
‘This is a grow tent.’ ”
Cuomo’s proposed recreational
weed plan, however,
would not allow New Yorkers
to grow at home as it’s currently
written, according to a
rep for drug-law-reform group
the Drug Policy Alliance, Jag
Davies, who said the organization
is pushing Albany lawmakers
to permit home cultivation
as part of the scheme.
But Pettit isn’t just looking
to individual clients to grow
his growing-cabinet sales. The
maker wants to cut a deal with
a larger operation to mass produce
his lush decor, which he
will show off to professional
interior designers and architects
at a design show in Manhattan
later this month.
Take a gander at Robert
Pettit’s fancy growing
cabinets at the Architectural
Digest Design Show at Piers
92 and 94 (771 12th Ave.
near W. 52nd Street in Manhattan,
www.addesignshow.
com). March 22–23, from 10
am to 6 pm. March 24, from
10 am to 5 pm. $32.
weed-cultivation system.
Photo by Colin Mixson
Leaf and Wood
LEAVES OF
GRASS
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