A few years ago, Ashley Albert flew longtime pal Jonathan Schnapp to her home state of Florida as a birthday gift. As a youth, Schnapp had traveled there with his family, where he played shuffleboard with his grandparents.
Once in the Sunshine State, Albert and Schnapp looked for a friendly game of shuffleboard — and wound up at a Friday night party in St. Petersburg at what turned out to be the largest shuffleboard club in the world. And it looked a lot like Brooklyn: There was a punk band, a veggie hot dog cart and a mix of “hipsters, jocks and weirdos.”
“We were like, ‘Oh my god, this is fantastic,’ ” Albert, 40, says. “We came back up to New York and we were like, this could be great up in Brooklyn.”
This dream to launch New York City’s first legit shuffleboard club is now a reality.
The Royal Palms Shuffleboard Club, at 514 Union Street in Gowanus, is opening to the public in a few weeks (go to royalpalmsshuffle.com for updates) — part of a neighborhood transformation some locals are calling a “Gowanaissance.”
Ten powder-blue courts span the 17,000-square-foot space; two 26-foot bars line the walls, where beer, wine and tropics-inspired cocktails will be served. The other walls are lined with black-and-white leather booth cabanas. Rotating food trucks can drive right inside the building, too.
Shuffleboard patrons will pay by the hour (rates not yet set) to rent the lanes, and will be able to reserve cabanas and lanes ahead of time.
The early preview crowd this week was eager about welcoming a new game into the neighborhood.
“I’m an old-person fanatic; I like old things: old-man hats, grappa, bocce ball,” 30-something Chris Livingston says between games. “This is a low-stress high-sociable kind of sport.”
Let the games begin.