"I feel so grateful, so lucky to be here, and it's so nice to be making pizza for my neighbors."
—Ben Wexler-Waite, quoted in Brooklyn Magazine.
Il Leone finally opened at 158 Seventh Avenue after three years of finding the space, raising money, and working through construction. But the harder part of the story isn't the three years. It's where he ended up. Il Leone's brick and mortar location sits two blocks from the apartment where Wexler-Waite and his girlfriend Lizzie already lived. He grew up in Park Slope. He never really left.
That detail changes how you should read the wave of restaurant openings that's hit Fifth and Seventh Avenue over the past year. The easy story is that Park Slope is having a moment, the way every Brooklyn neighborhood eventually gets its turn. The more useful story is narrower: some of the chefs behind these openings were already Park Slope residents, while others followed different paths.
A Regular Handed Jay Kumar a Key
Jay Kumar didn't go looking for his second Park Slope address. It came to him through a regular.
Kumar is the chef behind Lore, the modern American restaurant on Seventh Avenue that earned a Michelin Bib Gourmand in both 2024 and 2025 and was named Best Restaurant in Brooklyn by the NYC Hospitality Alliance. He's also a Park Slope resident. When a Lore regular mentioned a vacant space for sale on Sixth Avenue near her own apartment, hoping he could do something with it, Kumar went to look. Another Park Slope resident with the means to buy the unit came along, purchased it in the summer of 2024, and leased it to Kumar.
What followed was a year of permits, renovation, and interior design by Kumar's wife Daria Greene, who also designed Lore. Folk opened at 689 Sixth Avenue, on the corner of 20th Street, in December 2025. Kumar has said the goal was a bar where regulars matter enough to get a cocktail named after them. That's not a site-selection strategy. It's what happens when a chef's existing neighborhood network hands him a lease.
The Chef Who Closed Early in Maine to Get Home Sooner
Wexler-Waite's path to Seventh Avenue ran through an island off the coast of Portland.
He opened the original Il Leone as a seasonal pop-up on Peaks Island, Maine, in the summer of 2021, serving naturally leavened, sourdough pizzas out of a trailer to visitors willing to take the ferry. The pies built a following, especially the lobster-topped "Isola." But Wexler-Waite and Lizzie had been living in Park Slope during the off-season for years. When he decided to open a year-round location, he took over the old Bar Vinazio space at 158 Seventh Avenue and shut down the Maine location a week early to get a head start on the Brooklyn build-out. Il Leone officially opened November 13, 2025.
The Peaks Island location isn't gone. Wexler-Waite has confirmed it will keep operating on a seasonal basis. But the year-round restaurant went to the two blocks where he already lived, not to whichever Brooklyn neighborhood had the most attractive foot-traffic numbers.
Suho Lee Chose One Block on Fifth Avenue Over All of New York
Not every chef in this pattern grew up in Park Slope. Suho Lee didn't. He grew up in Suwon, near Seoul, and moved to Downtown Brooklyn in 2013. What he had instead of hometown roots was a specific frustration: gukbap, the rice-and-soup dish that's a daily staple across Korea, from street carts to fine dining, was hard to find done well anywhere in New York City.
Lee opened Andamiro at 276 Fifth Avenue, between First Street and Garfield Place, in the space that used to be Naruto Ramen, on November 17, 2025. Brooklyn Magazine reviewed the restaurant in March 2026 and called the gukbap one of the best dishes the writer had eaten all year. Lee has said his goal was affordable food with real authenticity, and that he loves the vibe of Park Slope. The more concrete point is the choice itself. Lee had all of New York City to work with. He picked one block on Fifth Avenue to make his case.
A Michelin Team Chose the Same Two Blocks, No Residency Required
Not every credentialed opening on this stretch is explained by a chef's zip code. Vato, the all-day tortillería and restaurant from the team behind the Michelin-starred Corima on the Lower East Side, opened at 226 Seventh Avenue on November 20, 2025, with dinner service arriving in mid-December. Chef Fidel Caballero and his partners, Sofia Ostos, Paco Alonso, and Erica Alonso, didn't need Park Slope. Corima had already delivered a Michelin star, a James Beard semifinalist nod, and a spot on Bon Appétit's list of best new restaurants. Nothing in their background points to any of them already living on these blocks. Vato serves an all-day format: sourdough tortillas and Chihuahuan-style burritos by morning, a Basque-inflected dinner service by night.
That's a third mechanism sitting next to the resident-chef pattern. A proven kitchen can extend its name to a new corridor with an all-day format, whether or not anyone on the team sleeps two blocks away.
Not Every Opening Follows the Same Math
The resident-chef pattern explains Folk and Il Leone. Andamiro tells a different story: Lee was frustrated that good gukbap was hard to find in New York. That pattern doesn't explain everything that's landed on the same two avenues, and the distinction matters if you're trying to read what's actually happening on your own block.
NAYA opened its Park Slope location at 311 7th Avenue on September 16, 2026, in the former Dave's Hot Chicken space. This wasn't a chef choosing a neighborhood. It was corporate expansion math: the Lebanese fast-casual chain's ninth opening of 2026, its 50th location overall, and its fourth in Brooklyn, part of founder Hady Kfoury's stated target of 200 locations nationwide by 2030. The Park Slope shop became the first Brooklyn NAYA to carry a Kids Meal.
Villager, the specialty coffee shop with a following built on Classon Avenue, confirmed plans this spring for a second Brooklyn cafe at 374 Fifth Avenue, as reported by Crain's New York Business. The expansion targets a gap coffee publication Sprudge has flagged: Fifth Avenue is under-served by third-wave coffee relative to its foot traffic. As of that reporting, no opening date or menu had been made public. This is a business reading a market, not a chef reading their own commute.
Apapachó, a Mexican restaurant from two of the owners of Alma Negra on Fourth Avenue, opened at 191 Fifth Avenue, near Berkeley Place, on August 2, 2026. That's an established local operator extending a proven concept to a second address a short walk from the first one.
If you're curious which blocks the chefs cooking your dinner already call home, Call Jon at Aguilar New York for a walk through Fifth and Seventh Avenue, including what's opening next.
