When the Brooklyn Flea begins its outdoor season this April, it will be its third birthday, the kickoff to a fourth year for the ever-growing marketplace. On Saturdays, as usual, the Flea will operate out of the playground of the Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School in Fort Greene. But the Flea’s organizers, Jon Butler and Eric Demby, have been searching out a place for the Flea to live on Sundays when the playground is no longer available. The pair tell Intel that they’ve finally found just the right spot: a 40,000-square-foot patch of land that will fit the same amount of stalls as the school but will have an even better view. They’ll be taking over the empty plot of land next to the first two towers of the massive EDGE Williamsburg residential complex, a space that is adjacent to the East River State Park and enjoys a spectacular view of the Manhattan skyline.
“They had enough space for three large towers,” explained Butler. “They’ve built two of them, for obvious reasons right now they’re taking a breather before they put up the third. We are going to take up that site, right there between 6th and 7th Streets.” They’ll pay rent to EDGE, which has agreed to landscape the muddy area to better suit their needs. (Butler and Demby are also in the midst of brainstorming what to do with the site on Saturdays, when the Flea will be over in Fort Greene. Through the winter it will remain at the smaller location inside One Hanson.) “Being next to the park also is going to be nice for us. I hope that will be a magnet for people,” says Butler. “Hopefully everybody walks out of the L train and down along 6th Street and ends up in our market.”
Related: The Bust of the Williamsburg Condo Boom [NYM]
