Friday, November 27, 2009

Smith & Vine Expands to Storefront Next to Trader Joe's


Patrick Watson and Michele Pravda, the husband and wife team behind the ever-expanding Smith & Vine empire in Brooklyn (a wine store, a cheese store, a cocktail joint and counting) will open, in a couple weeks, their second wine shop.

It will be called the Brooklyn Wine Exchange and will be ideally located right next door to the Cobble Hill Trader Joe's on Court Street. (That's the storefront, above, to the left of the picture, with Trader Joe's in the near distance.) It will thus be able to capitalize on the wine needs of the grocery store's habitues. (Unlike the Trader Joe's in Manhattan, this store does not have an affiliated wine shop one door over.)

Watson said the new stop will focus New World wines, meaning vino from the Americas, Australia, New Zealand on the like. Smith & Vine tends to focus on small, artisinal vintners from Europe, though it does have a small selection of American wines. Given Watson & Pravda's good taste—and my general aversion to the big bodied, International Style of most South American and Australia wines—it will be interested to see what sort of inventory they come up.

The Brooklyn Wine Exchange will also have an education area where wine classes will be conducted. It will not be a ditto of Smith & Vine, but have a character of its own. Watson & Pravda have long conducted occasional wine classes, but they have been off-premise, in nearly restaurants.

UPDATE: Opening is probably on Saturday, Dec. 5.

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