I was happy to see a New York Times story on the building at 33 Flatbush Ave. a couple of days ago. The former bank in downtown Brooklyn is home to a rough cöop­er­a­tive of artists, scien­tists, chefs, design­ers and other creative types; my friend Lainie Feffer­man recently laid claim to a small space there, a kind of “studio away from home” for composers, called Exapno. A weath­ered mountain-man named Al holds the place down, and fills it with his collec­tion of salvaged furni­ture and other urban archi­tec­tural detritus. 

Lainie set me loose in 33 Flatbush a few months ago with my camera. It’s a fasci­nat­ing space, made more wonder­ful by the vast and random assort­ment of activ­i­ties going inside it (and on top of it). Here are some of my favorite photos from that afternoon.