For fifteen years, the corner of Vanderbilt Avenue and Pacific Street served ramen. Chuko opened there for good on August 31, 2011, and in early August of this year Eater reported that the shop had closed at 565 Vanderbilt. In late May the owners had posted cryptic plans to go offline only until September. Their updated message gave no reason for the closing and said only, "Follow us for updates on what's next."
The corner sat dark for about two months. On October 11, a new ramen house opened in the same space. Eight days earlier and on the far side of the neighborhood, the Brooklyn Museum opened a show of more than 600 manga drawings in its Great Hall. Between them, these two openings set Prospect Heights' calendar from now through the end of January. The neighborhood's biggest exhibition and its most-watched restaurant corner are both Japanese this season, and the programs around them run on dates you can plan around.
The Corner Kept Its Ramen
The new tenant is SSRP, short for "Slurp, Sip, Repeat." Patch reported that it comes from the team behind Nourish and Ozakaya and that it took over the Chuko space. Eater's October openings roundup calls it a Japanese ramen house and izakaya. The main dish is tonkotsu ramen made with slow-simmered broth, slow-cooked pork chashu and house-made noodles. The room has an industrial look, a slurping black cat for a logo and lit-up lettering in capital letters.
Brooklyn Bridge Parents put the classic tonkotsu bowl at $23. The restaurant's own site promises "plenty to try beyond the bowl too, including bites to share," and SSRP takes reservations on Resy.
Neighbors who knew Chuko will remember what it was known for. Eater described it as Brooklyn's breakout ramen shop, one that served vegetarians and meat-eaters alike, with okonomiyaki-style tots, steamed buns and half-price sake on weekdays. SSRP's opening menu is built around pork broth, and the owners present it as their own restaurant rather than a revival of Chuko.
At the Other End of the Neighborhood, Manga Fills the Great Hall
Art of Manga runs through January 31, 2027, on the Brooklyn Museum's first floor. The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco organized it, and ARTnews notes that it was shown earlier at San Francisco's de Young Museum. In August, Time Out described the fall season as a "manga takeover," and the Great Hall setting shows the museum agrees.
The artist list covers several generations of the form. It includes Akatsuka Fujio, Araki Hirohiko, Chiba Tetsuya, Oda Eiichiro, Tagame Gengoroh, Takahashi Rumiko, Taniguchi Jirō, Yamashita Kazumi, Yamazaki Mari and Yoshinaga Fumi. The drawings include pages from Inuyasha, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Ōoku: The Inner Chambers and ONE PIECE.
Entry is by timed ticket, so walking in on a whim is a gamble. The museum's ticket page lists these prices for ticketed exhibitions:
| Visitor | Ticketed exhibition price |
|---|---|
| Adult | $30 |
| Adult 65+ and students | $21 |
| Ages 4 to 12 | $12 |
| Members | Free |
Members get in free, which matters once you see how much programming the museum has scheduled around this one show.
A Season Built Around One Show
The museum treats Art of Manga as something to come back to. Its exhibition page lists programs tied to the show on most weeks between now and mid-December, with one more just before it closes:
- Saturday, November 7: Member Mornings.
- Sunday, November 8: Casita Manga Book Club, reading Inuyasha.
- Wednesday, November 11: Stroller Tours.
- Friday, November 13, 4:30 to 7:30 p.m.: Anime x Art-Making Night for ages 13 to 22, with screenings and art-making. Registration is free, the event is free with museum admission, and the museum encourages registering ahead.
- Tuesday, November 17: Verbal Description Tour.
- Thursday, November 19: Curator-Led Member Tour.
- Tuesday, November 24: Brooklyn Mornings.
- Sunday, December 6, 1 to 3 p.m.: Casita Manga Book Club on Ōoku: The Inner Chambers, with a group reading, a discussion, a manga-style portrait and exhibition access. Tickets are $40 including the book and portrait, or $24 for members.
- Thursday, December 10, 7 to 9 p.m.: Art History Happy Hour on Art of Manga. Tickets are $30 including exhibition access and one specialty drink, or $18 for members.
- Saturday, January 30, 2027, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.: ASL Tour of Art of Manga.
On paper, the two book clubs bracket the run. November starts with Takahashi Rumiko's Inuyasha, and December moves to Yoshinaga Fumi's Ōoku, both of which have pages in the show. A neighbor who reads along could see the original drawings for each book within a month of discussing it.
A note for planning purposes: the museum's First Saturdays series lists its 2026 programs only through August and says updates for the 2027 season are coming. Don't build a November or December evening around it.
Ninagawa's Flowers, and the Maples Next Door
The manga show isn't the museum's only Japanese artist this fall. Mika Ninagawa: Feel the Flow(ers) opened October 2 in the Toby Devan Lewis Education Center. The museum calls it the photographer's first immersive installation in the United States. It runs into April 2027 and is included with general admission, so it doesn't need a timed manga ticket and will outlast the manga show by about two months.
Next door, Brooklyn Botanic Garden's Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden adds the season's color. The garden's fall guide says its Japanese maples turn in autumn. The bloom calendar puts peak foliage in October and November, which means a visit in the first weeks of this month should still catch it.
The Japanese thread at the garden continues into December. A Japanese-style kokedama workshop is set for Saturday, December 19, with sessions at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. It costs $102, or $94 for members, including a $25 materials fee. In between comes the garden's big winter event. Lightscape runs November 20, 2026, through January 3, 2027. Adult tickets cost $29 on Value Nights, $39 off-peak and $44 peak, and tickets for children ages 3 to 11 cost $15, $22 and $28. An Anytime Entry ticket costs $59, and the garden says its prices include all fees. The schedule also includes 21+ Nights on December 10 and 17 and Sensory-Friendly Early Entry at 4 p.m. on December 3 and 18.
December 10 is the busiest date on the calendar. The Art History Happy Hour at the museum and a 21+ Lightscape night fall on the same Thursday, a few steps apart on the same stretch of Eastern Parkway and Washington Avenue.
Around the Ramen Corner, the Rest of Vanderbilt Moved Too
SSRP was the second notable change near Vanderbilt and Pacific in less than two weeks. Wayward Fare, at 554 Vanderbilt Avenue, closed on Friday, October 2. Eater reported that chef-owner Akhtar Nawab is working on something new for the space.
A little farther afield, Wilkie opened as a corner bar at 820 Franklin Avenue on Wednesday, October 21. Patch's October 27 report listed $13 cocktails, $7 snaquiris and $7 beer-and-shot combos. While the bar works out its own menu, guests can bring food in. That makes Wilkie a natural follow-up to takeout from the neighborhood's newer kitchens.
On Carlton Avenue, Brooklyn Bridge Parents listed Best Friend Cafe as "coming soon" at 535 Carlton in its October roundup. Saturdays still begin at the Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket, which runs year-round from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Prospect Park West and Flatbush Avenue. November 7 lines up neatly: the Greenmarket in the morning, the museum's member morning, and ramen on Vanderbilt by evening.
Ramen at Vanderbilt and Pacific is open again. The manga drawings stay in the Great Hall through January 31. The museum's manga programs run on dated nights through December 10, with an ASL tour on January 30, and the garden's maples, workshop and lights fill in the weeks between. Ninagawa's flowers stay into April 2027, after everything else has closed.
Walking tours and stories of neighborhoods like this one are a big part of how I work, and Prospect Heights this season tells a story that rewards being walked. If you want to talk about the blocks between Vanderbilt Avenue and Eastern Parkway, from what's opening to what the houses on them hold, Jeffrey Goodman is glad to share what he knows. Let's Connect.
