Empire Stores is a former warehouse complex along the waterfront

Brooklyn Bridge Park Brooklyn Bridge Park is an park on the Brooklyn side of the East River in New York City. Designed by landscape architecture firm Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, the park is located on a plot of land from Atlantic Avenue in the south, und ...

within the neighborhood of

Dumbo ''Dumbo'' is a 1941 American animated fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by RKO Radio Pictures. The fourth Disney animated feature film, it is based upon the storyline written by Helen Aberson and Harold Pearl, a ...

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sover ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

. It hosts a food hall and market operated by Time Out New York, which opened in 2019, as well as an art gallery called Gallery 55.

Description and history

Time Out Market, 55 Water Street, Brooklyn NY

Empire Stores comprises seven buildings with a total of of space. The building was originally completed in 1869, with additions made in 1885. It housed a number of businesses in its life as a cargo warehouse (coffee beans, sugar, molasses) for nearly a century, before being abandoned in the 1960s. In 2013, Brooklyn developer Midtown Equities was selected to redevelop the abandoned Empire Stores warehouses into a mix of commercial and office space, designed by

Studio V Architecture Studio V Architecture, styled as STUDIO V Architecture, founded in 2006, is a New York City-based architecture and planning firm led by Jay Valgora. The firm executes projects across New York and throughout the tri-state region. Studio V has been hi ...

and S9 Architecture. The plan contained commercial and office space; restaurants and event areas; and a publicly accessible central passageway, courtyard, and rooftop. Many of the original design features were retained, such as schist walls, iron hoisting wheels, and coffee chutes. The ground floor was lowered several inches to integrate more smoothly with the rest of the park, but since the buildings are located directly on the waterfront, this makes them vulnerable to flooding during a

storm surge A storm surge, storm flood, tidal surge, or storm tide is a coastal flood or tsunami-like phenomenon of rising water commonly associated with low-pressure weather systems, such as cyclones. It is measured as the rise in water level above the n ...

. As a result, deployable

flood barrier A flood barrier, surge barrier or storm surge barrier is a specific type of floodgate, designed to prevent a storm surge or spring tide from flooding the protected area behind the barrier. A surge barrier is almost always part of a larger flood p ...

s were purchased for Empire Stores, and the complex includes

transformer A transformer is a passive component that transfers electrical energy from one electrical circuit to another circuit, or multiple circuits. A varying current in any coil of the transformer produces a varying magnetic flux in the transformer' ...

s on the seventh floor and a backup

power generator Electricity generation is the process of generating electric power from sources of primary energy. For utilities in the electric power industry, it is the stage prior to its delivery ( transmission, distribution, etc.) to end users or its sto ...

. The

Brooklyn Historical Society The Center for Brooklyn History (CBH, formerly known as the Brooklyn Historical Society) is a museum, library, and educational center founded in 1863 that preserves and encourages the study of Brooklyn's 400-year history. The center's Romanesque R ...

(BHS) was selected to operate a museum to celebrate Brooklyn's industrial history. Other future tenants included the area restaurant Vinegar Hill House, the watchmaker Shinola, a

beer garden A beer garden (German: ''Biergarten'') is an outdoor area in which beer and food are served, typically at shared tables shaded by trees. Beer gardens originated in Bavaria, of which Munich is the capital city, in the 19th century, and remain co ...

on the roof, and several other eateries. Midtown Equities originally intended to open Empire Stores in 2015. The flagship West Elm store, opened in August 2016, was the first tenant to open in Empire Stores, and for a year was the only tenant within the shopping complex. This was followed by the BHS Dumbo exhibition space in May 2017. Upon the opening of other shops, Empire Stores' waterfront location quickly became a popular spot for

selfie A selfie () is a self-portrait photograph, typically taken with a digital camera or smartphone, which may be held in the hand or supported by a selfie stick. Selfies are often shared on social media, via social networking services such as F ...

s, especially those with the Brooklyn Bridge in the background.

Time Out Market New York

In early 2018, it was announced that Time Out Market New York would open a food hall in Empire Stores with 20 restaurants and three bars. The market opened in May 2019.

References

External links

* {{New York City Malls Brooklyn Bridge Park Commercial buildings in Brooklyn Dumbo, Brooklyn Shopping malls in New York City