I can appreciate the 19th Century fashion craze—woolen trousers, ties, newsboy caps, cotton undershirts—but this is taking things too far:

This flamboyance is part of a curious new movement called Tweed Rides, informal gatherings of spiffily dressed ladies and gents cycling leisurely through town and disdaining finish lines. Tweed Rides began in London earlier this year and have spread this fall to Boston, San Francisco and Chicago. As the directions for this weekend’s Tweed Ride in Washington, D.C., put it: “Leave the fleece, Lycra and outer shell at home. This ride is for the dandy.”

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 01:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

If a series of tweets between Animal's Bucky Turco and Burning Angel's Joanna Angel are any indication, the Hipster Grifter is allegedly looking to make a little career move after serving her nine-month sentence in a Utah jail and do some porn, er, pose nude.

Now, she's been published nude before after some photos were leaked on a blog during Hipster Grifter-Gate earlier this year, but this is different. This would be THG posing for Burning Angel, a site that is self-described as, "Alt, Emo, Tattoo, Goth, and Punk Rock hardcore porn at it's best with video, pics and blogs."

For Kari, this is a fantastic development. THG the brand is only getting edgier, and if she keeps sending these letters from a Utah jail that Animal's been publishing, her tattooed star will only shine brighter. And as Bucky tells us, "It can't hurt her resume and she is going to need a job when she gets out."

The correspondence:

Bucky Turco: @JoannaAngel Hey Joanna. The Hipster Grifter once again asked about a photo shoot when she gets out. Do you have an answer for her?

Joanna Angel: @buckyturco yes i would love to have her on the website.

Bucky Turco: @JoannaAngel Cool. I'm gonna print out your tweet and mail it to her. Thanks!

Fly, little USPS delivery man, and send along the printed tweet of news! The media world awaits the impending stream of hotdogs and hallways.

UPDATE!!!1!!: Bucky noticed I missed a rather important tweet in this whole shi-bang, from one Joanna Angel: "@buckyturco tell her I would love to fuck her on camera... I think we'd have a lot of fun =)". Joanna Angel. Wants to fuck. The Hipster Grifter. On camera. Good night, and good luck.

Posted by Brian Ries at 12:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hipsters have a reputation for basically being pussies, what with their tight black jeans, ironic haircuts and ability to run from the cops while recording the footage with their iPhones and yelling, "I'm gonna put this on the internets you pigs!" So, naturally, the cops probably don't like that!

Gothamist spotted a twaddler who wrote, "Just found out cops in williamsburg call hipsters marshmallows because we are white and soft," and therefore recommends that this observation becomes reality. So, squishy ones, will you embrace it? Or, are you "offended"?

After the jump, please find a related video of someone microwaving a Peep.

Continue reading "Hipsters May Now Be Referred To As Marshmallows" »

Posted by Brian Ries at 11:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Pabst Blue Ribbon, or PBR as it's so affectionately called, has seen its sales rise 25% this year despite a crippling recession and price hike that brought a case to "$1.50 more than MillerCoors' Keystone, $1 more than Anheuser-Busch's Busch and Natural brands, and 50 cents more than Miller High Life." Hipsters, it's long been known, have led the charge in making PBR such a powerhorse in the shitty piss-water beer market. But when did this all start? Years ago, Ad age reports.

Back in 2004, Pabst executed a highly effective word-of-mouth campaign that made the long-declining brand an "ironic downscale chic" choice for bike messengers and other younger drinkers who viewed the beer as a statement of non-mainstream taste. PBR sales surged by nearly 17% that year, and have climbed at single-digit rates since, until this year, when the recession sent its sales soaring as more drinkers were pushed into the subpremium category.

You hear that? PBR is now subpremium, which by my scale is way too close to that "mainstream beer" that you all refuse to imbibe in. So what's next, PBR drinkers? Expect Monday Night Football commercials featuring dudes getting laaaaaid while holding footballs and throwing high fives.

It's time to let our Ribbon'd friend go, bike messengers and angry youths, and start the hunt for a new icon of the underground to slurp up with your rebellious lips.

My vote? Genny Cream Ale and/or Modelo. Or what if we all just drank Hugs, those little juice drinks that look like grenades. That'll get 'em. What's your vote?

Posted by Brian Ries at 11:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (20)

It seems like the Girl Talk is a ‘celebration of waste’, like they are just converting a local park into a ‘huge fucking dumpster.’

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 05:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

[via toothpastefordinner]

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 10:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

A group of Jews create a Golem to fight the Williamsburg hipsters in this video by Stephen Levinson and Jason Reich, starring Jonathan Katz. The Golem's really funny! And as Curbed notes, "Trustafarians, golems and gentrification gags are all accounted for" in this book trailer for The Jewish Body.

Posted by Brian Ries at 09:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Time published "A Brief History of Hipsters" today, because we all need that, and captioned the above Getty photo of people tossing water balloons in McCarren with, "Hipsters participate in a water balloon toss as they try and beat the heat at Tom Stofka Garden park in the Williamsburg neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough of New York City." Oops! What's that about?

In fact, Tom Stofka Garden is the beautiful memorial garden at the park's Driggs Avenue entrance, named for the deceased former Director of Brooklyn Forestry, Tom Stofka. He helped get the city's first tree census off the ground, among many other wonderful things.

Anyways, they talk about this whole problem everyone's having with moniez and how it affects everyone in W'burg...

The hip have been hit with a double whammy of economic reality — more are struggling to pay the rent as parental support dries up, and their carefully gentrified neighborhood is gradually being infiltrated by squatters inhabiting Williamsburg's stalled building projects. Hipsterdom's largest natural habitat, it seems, is under threat.

TIME

Update: They fixed it to read, "New York hipsters participate in a water-balloon toss at Tom Stofka Garden in McCarren Park in Williamsburg, Brooklyn," which is STILL wrong. They aren't in the freakin' garden. Sheesh.

Update 2: TimeHipsterGate is over. Everybody go home. It now correctly reads, "New York hipsters participate in a water-balloon toss at McCarren Park in Williamsburg, Brooklyn."

Posted by Brian Ries at 04:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

I've got a new piece over at The Morning News. I'd sworn off writing about hipsters, but got sucked back in by all the rage they still evoke. Here's a taste.

You get the sense that if Jimi Hendrix were to show up in Echo Park today, he’d be publicly mocked in a style section piece on blipsters for wearing a feathered fedora. Duchamp would have given up as soon as he appeared on dadaist-or-douchebag.com. And Warhol would be demonized as a hipster gentrifier for setting up his factory in a Brooklyn warehouse. Critics continue to complain that we live in an era where all art is derivative and devoid of substance. But if Hendrix, Duchamp, or Warhol were alive today, we’d be doing our damnedest to derail their self-expression, dismissing them as fucking hipsters.

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 10:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Our local athletes suddenly find themselves running into trees - a problem! - whilst playing kickball in McCarren Park. So, to get to the bottom of this scoop, the Brooklyn Paper sent out the grizzled Ben Muessig to investigate the unfortunate planting of these "trees"....

The 20-odd baby trees, which were planted as a part of Mayor Bloomberg’s “Million Trees” program, affect all three Brooklyn Kickball fields, which are used simultaneously on Sunday nights.

“You have to watch out, or else you’ll get hit in the back of the head,” said Bushwick resident B.J. Steiner of the “Divine Sisterhood of the Sacred Bleeding Heart” squad.

The city responded:

“This area was originally conceived as a passive-use area,” Parks Department spokesman Phil Abramson wrote in an e-mail. “With many venues in McCarren Park already dedicated to active recreation such as its ballfields, turf field, running track and basketball courts, we also strive to ensure that space is available for more passive pursuits such as picnics, sunbathing, and book reading.”

Let me know how sunbathing under these new trees works out for you. In regards to your "passive-use" quote, Parks Department spokesman Phil Abramson, I would like to say, "That's what she said." Thank you and good night.

[photo by Katie Chao, c/o Brooklyn Paper]

Posted by Brian Ries at 04:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 05:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Assimilated Negro asked me to comment on the hipster casting call that we posted about earlier this week. From Gawker

Let's assume this thing isn't a hoax or an art project by a recent Oberlin grad who thinks he's bohemian because he found bedbugs in his beard.

Do you tap the family trust fund? Do you idolize Dan Deacon? Are you SO not worried about getting swine flu 'cause that shit only happens to poor people?

They're not looking for hipsters. They're looking for entitled idiots. And wait, before you say it, I'm well aware. The terms ‘hipster' and ‘entitled idiot' have been synonyms for close to a decade now. But come on, isn't hipster rage about as tired as PBR and trucker caps? Of course there are plenty of ridiculous, pretentious idiots in Williamsburg-and New York as a whole for that matter. But would you rather be living in a stripmall in the exurbs of Richmond where alt culture consists of seeing The String Cheese Incident perform on Friday at that state-run amphitheater next to Applebees? (I'm from VA, so I can make fun). Personally, I'd rather be in a place like Williamsburg where people appreciate film, music, and fashion, even if I do have to put up with people named Unicornicopia and the neighborhood's other goofy excesses.

I hope the hipsterhood reality series is for real. That way we can pin all our hipster rage on a handful of dipshits and begin recognizing the difference between artists, people who are cool, and entitled morons. We clearly need a few sacrificial lambs and anyone who would answer that casting call is a perfect fit.

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 05:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

We can only hope this is a joke. And as of yet, there is no content at hipsterhood.com.

[via]

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 11:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We want to give you a foldable hipster grifter with our mouth.

Who better to launch our new hipster foldables series, than Kari Ferrell, aka the Hipster Grifter. And just in time for Mother's Day! In case you missed it, her story was first detailed in the New York Observer by Doree Shafrir (speaking of Mother's Day, buy Doree's hilarious book!).

Now, Kari is making fresh headlines over at Animal New York and Gawker. ("I want to give you a mom job"... WTF!) And, UPDATE: apparently, she's now in custody. We should have included handcuffs in our foldable.

Each month, we'll be featuring a new Williamsburg foldable celebrity, care of the immensely talented Bryan of paperfoldables.com.

Send us photo submissions of local characters and microcelebrites—we're looking for additional Williamsburgers to make foldable. Don't make us do Kyp Malone. (Actually, how can we not do Kyp Malone?)

Instructions:
1. Download the Hipster Grifter foldable here (.pdf)
2. Print
3. Cut along black solid lines
4. Fold along dotted lines and tape, as instructed
5. Pull dress down to see boobz

Thanks again to Bryan. And remember, send us photos for future foldables!

DOWNLOAD THE HIPSTER GRIFTER PDF HERE

Screenshot and foldable after the jump.

UPDATE 2: Now there's a Hipster Grifter phone app.

Continue reading "Hipster Foldables: The Hipster Grifter" »

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 01:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (12)

Some hep cat looking for wacky trendsetters in Williamsburg, just sent us this. From the mailbag:

WILLIAMSBURG TYPES NEEDED Do you Rock Your Own Style?

WE ARE CURRENTLY LOOKING FOR THESE TYPES/LOOKS:

DJ's
Hipsters
Musicians
LES Types
Williamsburg Types
Artists
Rockers
Dancers
Performers
Street Artist
Graffiti Types
Hip/Nerd Look

And all other super cool folks!

Impossible Casting (impossiblecasting.com) is seeking the coolest New Yorkers for upcoming paid advertising campaigns. E-mail us some pictures at submit (AT) impossiblecasting.com. About US: Impossible Casting is NY's premier casting companies. We cast models, actors and real people for TV, Film, commercials and Print. We also find a lot of our best people right off the street.

image via

Who are the latest locals rocking their own style? We haven't seen the above or the Goth Pilgrim in a while. Let us know in comments, and please... SEND US PIX!

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 03:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, you did it pigs. The US has declared a public health emergency over this whole Swine Flu strain that's crept up from the backlots of Mexico and hunkered down in 8 or so high school students from Queens. I wonder how the dude who lives in Williamsburg with his pet pig is feeling about all this. It's used to, "Oh my god! Is that a pig? How cute!" but might now face screams and discrimination. Here he is in McCarren Park in happier times: (note the Rottweiler's cautiousness. it knew)

Posted by Brian Ries at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

[via]

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 01:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

via

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 12:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

The hipster grifter is getting so much press, clearly she needs a nickname. From this point onward, she's the "Grifster."

Here's yet another tale of Kari Ferrell's exploits detailing her fondness for the phrase "I wanna give you a handjob with my mouth." Turns out some dude named Chris Giganti made out with her, despite finding her a bit chubby and pimply, not to mention sketchy and borderline insane. But what do you expect, when you post a personals ad that says "Semi-professional buccaneer looking for pirate girl with eye patch and glasses for adventures including, but not limited to, commandeering ships, burying and subsequently digging up treasure, drinking, and other general swashbuckling," as Chris Giganti apparently did.

From invertedsoapbox.com

Being new to New York, I decided to post a personals ad on Craigslist pretending to be an unemployed pirate looking for a three-eyed hipster girl (glasses plus eye patch = three eyes) [read the ad here - Tim]. I wrote it with a mixture of sincerity and ludicrousness, with the secret hope that someone interesting and attractive might actually come across it and respond.

Most of the responses were from porn sites looking for subscribers. But then I got this very well-written note from someone named Korean Abdul-Jabar, listing about seven reasons why I should want to get to know her, signed Kari.

And I have to admit, they were pretty compelling reasons. She talked about being into music and science, and she said she had a degree in physics. She attached a photo, and the tattoo on her chest of a phoenix was nearly as enticing as the pixie crop and the mild look of benevolent disdain. She included a line indicating her enjoyment of giving handjobs via mouth -- a phrase already on its way to Brooklyn infamy -- that was both provocative and hilarious in its directness.

Continue reading "Another "Grifster" Story, This Time With Pirates" »

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

image c/o Twitter

Apparently, not everyone was satisfied with Twitter just cornering the "telling-the-world-what-you-are-doing/eating/thinking/excreting" market . Now it's supposed to get you a date as well. Via GothamList:

Tonight Hugs is hosting a "Twitter Fueled Singles Dance Party." The organizers say, 'the main novelty we have going is that some tech-minded folks we know have put together a chatroom where people can text message our twitter account, which will tweet whatever flirty notes people feel like saying about one another. And also we'll have ice cream, dancing, and so forth.

Posted by Jackie Snow at 01:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

From the mailbag:

I directed a music video for their song "88th Precinct" which is in competition to get on regular MTV rotation. However, they're up against musicians who have already had MTV air time and are signed to warner bros and have music videos with much larger budgets (considering our budget was no budget).

You can vote by going here: http://www.mtvu.com/music/the-freshmen/pick-this-weeks-freshmen-video-033009/

and you can vote as many times as you like. Voting ends this Friday at noon

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Who knew Bary Manilow grew up here? Williamsburg just got a little bit *cooler.* From men.style.com:

Q: You didn't have a lot of money growing up.
A: Oh, none. Zero. Zip. Nothin'. I come from nowhere Brooklyn, New York. Williamsburg, Brooklyn. These days Williamsburg is kind of a hip area, but when I grew up there, the taxi drivers wouldn't even go over the bridge, it was so dangerous.

Q: So you were the original Williamsburg hipster.
A: I wasn't really a hipster. I was a geek.

Continue reading "Barry Manilow the Original W-Burg Hipster" »

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 10:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Holy Jesus fuck! I recently came across something that has me baffled to the core: The Christian Hipster phenomenon. Apparently, Brett McCracken, a self-identified Christian hipster, is writing a book about a utopian world where Christians sit around and smoke cloves, drink 40s and pray together.

"This is a serious exploration. It’s not a joke, and though it is humorous at times and occasionally ironic, it is by no means an exercise in sarcasm (as in, say, Robert Lanham’s Hipster Handbook)... Whatever criticism I end up putting forward in the book, I hope that readers recognize that it is all for the ultimate refinement of the church and its mission in the world."

I see. Well then leave the sarcasm to me, because I'm going to go ahead and call this one a HIPSTER FAIL.

Continue reading "WWJD — If He Was a Hipster?" »

Posted by Lola Wakefield at 04:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Interactive Singles Map has been floating around for a while, but I just found it linked on the site of Virgil Griffith, the hot-in-a-nerdy-way creator of the Wiki Scanner, and successfully procrastinated with it for about an hour, changing views and tweaking the age levers.

The creator of the map has a few lol-worthy observations on the site, but I took the liberty of summarizing the data for you and interpreting it in the context of the Williamsburg dating scene:

If you're a chick, this map can either give you hopeful optimism or crush your single-but-looking spirit. On the one hand, not only does New York City contain 109,132 more men than women in the datable age-range, but single men overpopulate single women in pretty much ever city in the United States. Score! On the other hand, why are you still single? Burn!

Dudes... you now know you've got serious completion — unless you go for the cougars!

Happy hunting!

Posted by Lola Wakefield at 12:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Grub Street coined it. And the New York Times has a great story on the growing culinary movement in Brooklyn:

Gabrielle Langholtz, the editor of Edible Brooklyn, which chronicles the borough’s food scene, said it has grown along with the arrival of what she calls the “new demographic.”

“It’s that guy in the band with the big plastic glasses who’s already asking for grass-fed steak and knows about nibs,” Ms. Langholtz said.

“Ten years ago all of these people hadn’t moved to Brooklyn yet,” she added, comparing Brooklyn today to Berkeley in the 1970s. “There’s a relationship to food that comes with that approach to the universe,” Ms. Langholtz said. “Every person you pass has read Michael Pollan, every person has thought about joining a raw milk club, and if they haven’t made ricotta, they want to.”

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 12:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This could come in handy. [via Divine Caroline]

Posted by freewilliamsburg at 06:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)