Call it the Second (or Third) Wave of Gentrification on Smith Street in Carroll Gardens. There have been so many opening and closings on Brooklyn’s “Restaurant Row” of late, not to mention continued plain-old-gentrification of neighborhood staples, that your guidebook won’t be worth the paper on which it’s printed. There are at least a dozen openings, closings or ongoing renovations on Smith between Degraw Street and Altantic Avenue alone (and we stopped at Degraw). Among the closings: Baluchi’s, Smitty’s, Village 247, Banania (one of the original Smith St. trendies), Viola, Curry Source (on Bergen, morphing into a realty company...Score: Condos 1, Curry 0) and the Rosemary Room. (Yes, we know some bit the dust a while back.) Among the (brand new and semi-new) newcomers: Porchetta (new Italian in the Banania space), Provence en Boite (where Baluchi’s was…ending the Smith and Degraw Indian food war and sparking a French Food Fight in its place), Stinky (cheese), Bird (clothing), Oculus 20/20 (glasses), American Apparel (in a new development), Something Else, Dear Fieldbinder (clothing in the space of a design-type shop we've already forgotten) and a lot more, but we got tired of taking notes and wavered on where to draw the line between "new" and "old". At least another half-dozen storefronts are “in process.” Whether all this is a good thing or a bad thing, we don’t know, but we think you might want to call ahead to make sure the place you’re going is still there.
· Storefront Rentals on Smith Street: Still Hipster? [Curbed]
· Testy About Development in Carroll Gardens [Gowanus Lounge]
UPDATE: Eater's Plywood Report has exteriors from Provence en Boite.