Red Hook: Red Hook’s long-awaited Ikea — with a suitably long line — opened on Wednesday morning, heralding a new era for furniture shoppers, bargain hunters, meatball lovers and, perhaps more important, the troubled waterfront neighborhood. Comments (3)

Editorial: It is tempting to see the opening of Ikea in Red Hook as a sort of “retail therapy” for a neighborhood in the doldrums — but locals should not be tempted into inviting more big box stores to play in the Hook sandbox. Comments (4)

Red Hook: Red Hook residents are bracing to see if Ikea will do what no other controversial project has been able to do — reinvigorate the hardscrabble neighborhood or wipe it off the “up-and-coming” map for good. Comment

Red Hook: Red Hook — haven for big box shoppers or the most bicycle friendly neighborhood in the city? Well, why not both, thanks to this new design competition? Comment

Nightlife: Julie Reiner is a cocktail rock star. The Park Slope resident owns a set of swanky Manhattan lounges and is known worldwide for her spirit smarts and magical mixing. But when it came time to launch her next project, Reiner looked no further than her own backyard for a place to serve more of her high-class cocktails. Comment

Development: A developer’s bid to build a seven-story condo building over Hank’s Saloon in Boerum Hill was unanimously blocked last Wednesday by Community Board 2. Comment

Crime: Police arrested a teenager on Dwight Street on June 10 after a witness reported the young man was showing off a firearm and only later did the cops discover the hooligan had tried to blow them away. Plus all the other crime news from Red Hook, Carroll Gardens and Cobble Hill’s 76th Precinct. Comment

Theater: Like a giant gorilla tearing up the streets of New York, Pamela Sneed’s one-woman show — “Kong,” at Bath Beach’s Harry Warren Theater through June 29 — is taking on and tearing down the passivity and lack of responsibility that she said define theater today. Comment