Clinton Hill: Real history with a modern artistic flare

A walk down any of its streets or avenues shows that the historic, residential Clinton Hill is rapidly undergoing a change.

Restaurants, bars, bakeries and boutiques continue to pop up along its main corridors, Myrtle Avenue and Fulton Street, ushering in a charm to roads that were once deemed too dangerous by residents.

And tucked away on residential streets one can find a number of relatively new coffee shops like Clinton Park Café, nestled snugly on a brownstone block, Outpost Café, and Urban Vintage.

But though many new businesses have set up shop in the last 10 to 15 years, some long-timers remain — a testament that the community isn’t giving in so easily in to gentrification. Some of those businesses include the Clinton Hill Simply Art and Framing Gallery, which has been around for more than 21 years and Mike’s Coffee Shop which has been there for more than 70 years.

“It’s one of those neighborhoods that you can’t describe with one brush stroke,” said Benjamin Wilchfort, owner and manager of Brooklyn Suites, a company at 464 Classon Ave. that rents out furnished apartments to corporate travelers.

Named after the sixth governor of New York DeWitt Clinton, the tree-lined blocks in this nabe are adorned with majestic brownstones, historic mansions and Victorians.

According to the book, “The Big Onion Guide to Brooklyn,” in the late 19th century it was considered a prestigious place to live.

Oil tycoon Charles Pratt moved there in 1870. He later established The Pratt Institute of Art on Willoughby Avenue in 1887.

Clinton Avenue, with its stunning historic mansions, several of which were owned by the Pratt family, is known as “Millionaires’ Row.” It also has one of the city’s greatest concentrations of intact row houses from the post-Civil War era.

Similarly, A large part of Clinton Hill is designated as a historic district.

According to the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, those jagged boundaries extend roughly from Willoughby Avenue in the north to just shy of Fulton Street in the south, to the east by Hall and Downing Streets and to the west by Vanderbilt Avenue.

“You can tell when you’re in Clinton Hill; it’s beautiful and quiet,” said Todd Triplett, a resident for 13 years and owner of FREECANDY, a mixed-use art gallery and music at 905 Atlantic Ave.

Triplett said the nabe fosters innovation since it draws inspiration from The Pratt Institute, which contributes largely to the area’s artistic community, St. Joseph’s College, and the nearby Brooklyn Navy Yard, the historic shipyard that now serves as an industrial hub.

“There’s an infusion of creativity here that’s constant and stronger than other neighborhoods,” he said.

The area’s checkered past began to see an overhaul around 1999.

The Myrtle Avenue Revitalization project (MARP), founded in 1999 by Pratt President Thomas Schutte, was instrumental to the transformation of Myrtle Avenue. MARP along with the Myrtle Avenue Business Improvement District, created six years later, worked to improve the avenue while keeping some longstanding businesses in place.

“A lot of people don’t view Clinton Hill as a second choice because it’s improving. Families can be very happy here,” Wilchfort said. “And I don’t think it’s in any danger of becoming over-gentrified.”

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The building will include 48 affordable apartments and house an Associated supermarket, which was formerly at the same address, along with a TD Bank.

According to the Myrtle Avenue Brooklyn Partnership, a plan to build Myrtle Plaza, a pedestrian space on Myrtle Avenue between Hall Street and Emerson Place, was approved late last year by the New York City Public Design Commission.

The $6 million project is set to be 25,000 square feet and will include improved crossings, art installations and space for community programming.

Construction is set to begin this summer and will last over a year. The plan is to break ground in 2014.

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