Sitting on the corner of Henry and Sackett streets in the heart of Carroll Gardens is a piece of living history. Once a bustling pharmacy, the space is now a community gathering spot where root beer floats, ice cream sundaes and egg creams are served up for all to enjoy.
Founded in 2010 by siblings Gia Giasullo and Peter Freeman, Brooklyn Farmacy and Soda Fountain has become a place where generations come to make memories.
“Every day you live is another day in history,” Freeman said. “For instance, the Brooklyn Farmacy. Every day we open the door, we are making another notch in our history of this space.”
Before Freeman secured the space in 2009, it had been a neighborhood pharmacy from the early 1920s to the mid-1990s. Around 1970, ownership changed from the Italian Longo family to the Jewish Stein family. At the time, pharmacies were far more than a place to pick up prescriptions.
“Back in the day, if you had a problem, say a rash or you had something with your stomach, you would come and tell the pharmacist about it,” Freeman said. “And the pharmacist would then compound a remedy, a drug, an ointment, something for you to take. So it was far more than what we think of as a pharmacy. It was really a place that served the community on a daily basis.”
Freeman recalls how the space “found” him. He had just moved back to town and, knowing a friend in the building, stopped by. As soon as he saw it, he knew it was the right place. The abandoned pharmacy still had medicine in the cabinets, and the bones of the structure remained intact.
Being abandoned for so long brought challenges. The building was badly decayed, and medicine from the 1930s was rotting on the shelves. Renovating it would take money he didn’t have.
“On Sunday, I was mopping the floor, which is a beautiful floor. And I felt like whenever I had kind of lost hope, I would just mop the floor and it would renew my inspiration,” Freeman said. “And someone had pulled up on the hydrant outside asking directions. She was lost.”
That “someone” turned out to be a scouting agent for the Discovery Channel show “Construction Intervention,” looking for a space to renovate for the season finale. Determination, a bit of serendipity and the TV show’s help gave birth to the modern-day Brooklyn Farmacy.
The once-decaying pharmacy that served as a community anchor now continues that legacy, making new memories for people of all ages and backgrounds.
“When people talk about history, oftentimes they are talking about things that happened a long time ago, whereas this is history that is happening in the present, in the moment. Like it’s happening right now in front of you,” Freeman said. “Like this kid is having an egg cream for the first time, or a root beer float. And that’s what it’s about.”
The soda jerks at Brooklyn Farmacy take pride in their egg creams, a once-ubiquitous New York drink. When Freeman returned to the city, he was surprised by the scarcity of egg creams, which he had assumed would be part of the city’s fabric. He vowed to put them back at the top of the menu.
Though egg creams contain neither egg nor cream, their simple ingredients — seltzer, milk and syrup — make them a refreshing, fizzy drink with a hint of chocolate or vanilla.
“When you wanted a legit 100% New York chocolate egg cream, you could come to Brooklyn Farmacy and get it. And that’s what we staked our claim on,” Freeman said. “And we still live it every day. If our egg creams aren’t right, then we’re not right. And we are committed to that.”
That commitment paid off when Brooklyn Farmacy won the National Egg Cream Invitational in the spring. The shop aims to create a nostalgic experience, instilling the importance of the egg cream into each soda jerk and customer.
Whether customers come with family, on a date or to try an egg cream for the first time, Brooklyn Farmacy offers a chance to make memories, have fun and be part of living history.
“This is a place where you can be very conscious of your living history,” Freeman said. “And that’s a very powerful concept because the world moves fast. And this is a place where you can slow it all down to the point where you feel like you are almost living backwards.”
