ASPCA building in 2011

I had kind of ignored this, and then my kids told me it was BIG NEWS. Public Records, the restaurant and event space in Gowanus, is opening an 11,000-square-foot spot at the Seaport — address unknown (though one of you might have figured it out Luis Vazquez reported that the address is 219 Water Street, “a site that takes up the whole block front from Front to Water. It has sat vacant for DECADES!” The plan is to open in 2027 — my guess is it will have a different name.

Seaport Entertainment Group, which was spun off from the developer Howard Hughes and runs Pier 17, said that the restaurant “concept” will involve the revitalization of a historic building. Public Records opened in the historic ASPCA headquarters in 2017, doing an adaptive reuse of 6000 square feet in the 1910 building. There are four distinct spaces, including an outside garden.

In 2020, Esquire named Public Records one of the 27 “Best Bars in America,” noting the quality of the establishment’s sound systems and cohesive sense of flow.

The Infatuation, my go-to, describes Public Records this way: “Public Records is a big restaurant/bar in Gowanus that feels like a communal space you’d find in a utopian condo building. It has high ceilings and a huge skylight in the middle, there’s a great sound system, and the ceilings are lined with shelves of records (which seems impractical, but looks cool). There’s also a venue in the back that hosts ticketed shows (DJs, mostly), as well as a full vegan menu in case you want to sit down for dinner.” It makes their “Impressing Out-of-Towners” list.

“The Public Service team is reimagining social experiences by creating platforms that combine art, culture, design, and hospitality into a single, thoughtfully curated space,” said the press release from Matt Partridge, president and CEO of Seaport Entertainment Group. “Their proven ability to operate creative, inclusive, community-driven programming aligns with our vision for the Seaport and will add another unique layer of vibrancy to the neighborhood.”

Public Records partner Shane Davis described the new project this way: “We’re interested in giving new life to historic spaces through cultivating places with distinct identities…At Public Records, we focused on sound as a powerful method to connect people, with food and beverage playing a supporting role in the narrative. This new project is an opportunity for us to flip the model, focusing first on bringing people together through food and beverage, with sound as an adjacency.”