Featuring colorful brownstones and elegant new developments, Carroll Gardens is a well-balanced mix of old and new with qualities that have attracted generations of newcomers for decades, including houses with large front yards, lush and green with plants – hence the “gardens” in the neighborhood’s name. Smith Street is the main retail corridor, and its Carrol Gardens commercial retail space includes a mix of old-school and mom-and-pop shops, as well as numerous national retailers.
Home to some of Brooklyn’s hippest eateries, Carroll Gardens is known for its artisanal small businesses, and the rise of new developments has created room for plenty of daytime retail opportunities to serve a new generation of work-from-home types. Part of this neighborhood’s appeal is its cultural history, which spans most of western Europe – from Irish and Norwegian-Americans who settled here throughout the first half of the 19th century to a mid-century Italian-American influx and a late 1990s wave of French immigrants.