On Saturday, June 2nd and Sunday, June 3rd, BrooklynBest 2007, a Brooklyn Tourism destination event which officially launches Brooklyn’s summer season each year, took to Grand Army Plaza and several of the borough’s cultural institutions. Fireworks, fashion shows, musical performances, an 18-mile “Tour de Brooklyn” bike ride, mini-golf, and a 30th anniversary showing of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” starring Brooklyn’s own Richard Dreyfuss were among the activities enjoyed by Brooklynites and visitors alike.

The "Heart of Brooklyn" group-which includes Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn Children's Museum, Brooklyn Public Library, Prospect Park, Brooklyn Museum, and Prospect Park Zoo-also sponsored numerous special events, including an ice cream social at Prospect Park, a revved up Target "First Saturdays" program at the Brooklyn Museum, free trolley rides from Grand Army Plaza to the Brooklyn Children's Museum, a mobile library with more than 2,000 books sponsored by the Brooklyn Public Library, and a series of jazz concerts at the Cranford Rose Garden.

“This year’s BrooklynBest festival proves Brooklyn is not only one of the hottest tourist destinations in the world, as the respected Lonely Planet Travel Guide has proclaimed, but also one of the very best places in the world to call home!” said Borough President Markowitz.

Of note, the fashion shows (one curated by the originators of Brooklyn Fashion Weekend, and the other by the Brooklyn Borough President’s Office) featured the hottest designers, and anticipated the formation of the Brooklyn Fashion Council, a partnership of the Borough President’s Office, the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, and fashion industry stakeholders, which will hold its first meeting this summer.