Battered Seaport To Get a Summer Full of New Attractions

Starting Memorial Day weekend and throughout the summer, movies will be played at an outdoor theater set up at the intersection of Fulton and Front Streets, part of a larger initiative to revive the South Street Seaport. Renderings courtesy of Howard Hughes Corp.

The South Street Seaport will be bustling with more than just tourists this summer.

Starting Memorial Day weekend, the waterfront neighborhood will become home to retail outlets, a beer garden, outdoor movie theater and other temporary attractions as part of a revitalization initiative called “See/Change,” Seaport developer Howard Hughes Corp. announced on Wednesday.

“Pop-up” shops will be set up in shipping containers along Fulton and Front Streets and in front of the still-shuttered Fulton Market Building, which was heavily damaged by Hurricane Sandy and won’t reopen until 2014. Howard Hughes will also be replacing the Sandy-battered kiosks along Fulton Street this summer.

From late May to October, the Brooklyn Flea will be running a cafe and bar on a floor above the shops, as well as an eight-vendor “SmorgasBar” beer garden on Front Street, between Beekman and Fulton. The establishment takes its name from the Smorgasburg food market that originated in Williamsburg.

“We’re envisaging picnic-style tables out in the middle of the street,” Butler told CB1 last month. “We’re planning to have a small stereo for background music,” he added, “but no [live] bands.”

“The idea is, everyone’s been wiped out down here,” Butler said, “and there’s very little for residents, office workers and tourists, in general.”

There will also be a free weekly film series called “Front Row Cinema” (named after Front Street) and live concerts on Wednesday nights in June at an outdoor movie theater at Front and Fulton Streets that will be fitted with lounge chairs and a makeshift lawn.

The theater will have seating for about 35 and show action movies, comedies and family-friendly flicks, Lincoln Palsgrove, Howard Hughes’ senior marketing manager, told the Seaport Committee. (A preview screening is slated for Memorial Day weekend.)

“We’re looking at films that’re not going to be over 120-130 minutes,” he said, “because we don’t want anything to go past 10:15 or 10:30.”

Pier 17 will also offer live entertainment on a temporary stage, as in the past several summers. Participants in the Seaport Music Festival will perform on Friday nights in June—with a one-time, June 29 appearance by the 4Knot Music Festival—and musicians from the Sound Bites music series will perform on Sundays in August.

By June or July, glow-in-the-dark swings that play music will line the western edge of Titanic Park, at Fulton and Pearl Streets. And, provided it gets the necessary permits, Howard Hughes seeks to adorn South and Front Streets with lacy, Cantina lights.

In addition to its current shops, the Pier 17 mall and outdoor space, which will stay open through the summer, will house businesses displaced by Hurricane Sandy, in addition to new, seasonal stores.

Finally, art curated by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and event/marketing agency Brightest Young Things will be exhibited this summer in Cannon’s Art Walk, at 207 Front Street.

“It’ll be a combination of [work by] photographers and performance artists,” Brightest Young Things co-founder Svetlana Legetic told the Trib in a phone interview. “At any point in time, there should be some sort of installation in the space for people to check out. Each one would be there for a few weeks.”

The gallery will open on May 25 with an initial show, “Tomorrow, We Disappear,” featuring the work of fashion and travel photographer Joshua Kogan.

“We’re looking to have this glistening, golden-hour feel to it,” Legetic said of the opening. “We want to set the tone with a vibe of, anything could possibly happen.”