Things to Do in Brooklyn

Are you an art aficionado to the core? If so, the Brooklyn Museum is for you. Give your visual senses a near overload here, as the museum is New York City’s second largest—only the Metropolitan Museum of Art is bigger. Spanning 56,000 square feet with more than 1.5 million artworks to admire, the museum houses a world-class collection of Egyptian antiquities, African art, European painting, period rooms, decorative arts and contemporary art. A bonus is the ancient marble sculpture fragment from the late Ptolemaic Period—50 to 30 BC—that might just be Cleopatra.

If you want to see the best of Brooklyn, break out your walking shoes to experience the city by foot. An absolute must is a stroll along the Brooklyn Heights Promenade to witness a combo of history, architecture and breathtaking views of the Manhattan skyline, Statue of Liberty and Brooklyn Bridge. Venture into Brooklyn Heights for a stroll down tree-lined blocks—where you’ll also find original cobblestone streets—and past centuries-old townhouses and trolley tracks on Water Street. Park Slope offers a stunning mix of turn-of-the century brownstones. Wander around Williamsburg, a revitalized neighborhood on the East River waterfront still rich in history and tradition with converted warehouses abound that serve as lofts and studios for its many artists and musicians.

You can’t visit Brooklyn without experiencing Coney Island. An iconic amusement park with ever-evolving exhibitions, kinetic performances and dizzying rides, this neighborhood is also right on the beach with a boardwalk to boot. Gather your kids and plunge right in for a quintessential experience at Luna Park. The seaside amusement park offers 19 rides, including the historic Coney Island Cyclone wooden roller coaster that’s been thrilling riders since 1927. Other adrenaline-fueled rides include the Thunderbolt roller coaster and Slingshot, but there’s also rides for the kiddos like the Seaside Swing and Mermaid Parade. The Coney Island compound also includes the New York Aquarium, while the Coney Island Circus Sideshow features twisted exhibitions by sword swallowers, fire-eaters and freaky live performers.

Escape the hustle and bustle of the city and head to the handful of beaches in Brooklyn for a relaxing seaside respite. Be prepared to stake your claim in the sand early because you’ll likely be surrounded by many with the same idea. Coney Island Beach and Boardwalk is always humming with volleyball, handball and basketball courts, plus the screams from its adjacent amusement park add to its lively vibe. Nearby Brighton Beach offers a more family-friendly and diverse seaside experience. Known as “Little Odessa” and nicknamed for the Ukrainian city in which many of its emigrants hail, the neighborhood offers a slice of Russian culture and some of the best borscht in the city. Most beaches are accessible by public transit or a short ferry ride away.

For a grand entrance into Brooklyn, walk or bike across the Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan City Hall to Brooklyn Bridge Park. The historic bridge connects the two boroughs, spanning nearly 300 feet above the East River. A major thoroughfare for automobiles, the iconic bridge also features an elevated wooden walkway over the whizzing cars below for pedestrians and bicyclists. The bridge gets crowded, but those on bikes have their own lane—just remember to be mindful of others. While crossing, get an eyeful of the East River, Statue of Liberty, South Street Seaport and the Manhattan skyline, complete with circling boats and ferry traffic below. Your arrival in Brooklyn lands you at the Revolutionary-era Fulton Ferry Landing filled with numerous delights of riverfront promenades and lush gardens.

If you want an evening of avant-garde enchantment and progressive entertainment, you need not journey into Manhattan. Stay in Brooklyn for an evening of performing arts at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) in Fort Greene. The venue offers critically acclaimed, genre-defying productions of dance, theater, film, music and opera. BAM has 3 main buildings: a gloriously restored 1904 theater that looks like a Greco-Roman ruin, a Beaux Arts turn-of-the-century opera house and BAM Fisher, a new eco-friendly building that houses an arts center, studios and numerous spaces for education, rehearsal and performance. Check BAM’s schedule that includes cutting-edge cinema, established classical artists and composers, contemporary dance companies and emerging artists. BAM’s celebrated Next Wave Festival showcases tomorrow’s megawatt artists today.

Located in Prospect Park behind the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (BBG) is one of the most notable botanical gardens in the nation. The BBG blooms all year, with 52 acres of landscaped gardens, 40,000 kinds of plants, a bonsai museum and an indoor tropical conservatory. You can take in fragrant fields of lavender, a traditional Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden, unusual cacti in the Desert Pavilion and a huge orchid collection in the jungle-like Aquatic House. There are also plenty of kid-sized gardens to explore, including the Lily Pool Terrace, Discovery Garden, Butterfly Nature Walk and the annual Cherry Blossom Festival for the whole family to enjoy. Visiting in October? Check out the park's Halloween-themed events.

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