Out of all the pop-ups for summer, you’ll want to make the trek to Bushwick’s new outdoor beer garden, a gorgeous community-centered project with local brews, street art and even its own beach.
Wyckoff Beer Garden is now open through the end of October, taking over the empty lot at 33 Wyckoff Ave. just north of Starr Street off the Jefferson Avenue stop. Owners Gabriele Maurello and Tyagi Schwartz created something more like an urban garden and street art gallery rather than a typical bar, with brightly colored flowers overflowing from hand-built planters and art covering every surface, including the concrete floor.
“I’m a somewhat of a frustrated artist,” says Maurello, who also built the tables along with Schwartz. “I can’t paint or draw, but I can create something exciting.”
Neighborhood artists were invited to take over the 10,000-square-foot garden, hanging whimsical portraits along the perimeter of tin panels and covering the maze-like interior of panels put up specifically to make space for more art, making the space feel more like a gallery that happens to serve beer.
And in the back is the urban “beach,” a sand-covered corner where a bikini-clad Oprah holds an Octoberfest-size load of steins next to Jimmy Fallon in a Borat-style lime green swimsuit.
Try not to let that image put you off though. Wyckoff Beer Garden’s 30-foot beach shack-style bar serves a selection of cans heavy on small local breweries like Braven and Montauk. For food, the Lower East Side’s FryGuys brought their twice-fried fries covered in all the favorite drunk toppings like bacon, guac, queso and more, as well as funnel cake-shaped fries topped with powdered sugar and caramel. FryGuys is the only permanent vendor; others will rotate through the space.
