In Brooklyn, Greenpoint Ready to Follow in Williamsburg's Footsteps Uli Seit for The New York Times The warehouse-dotted coast of Greenpoint, Brooklyn, as seen from the roof of the Edge, a condominium in Williamsburg. HIPNESS is contagious in Brooklyn, where expanding the global brand seems to be a done deal. On a scorching July afternoon, the frisson of hustle and bustle that delineates the weekday rush hour was in full swing at the intersection of Greenpoint and Manhattan Avenues, the dowdy commercial heart of Greenpoint. Horns blared, and unlike other times of day or night, when the traffic ranges from intermittent to invisible, pedestrians actually did have to look both ways before jaywalking. In this, the genuine Brooklyn, crosswalks are for sissies, classic apartments are walk-ups, loud is the default sound level, and burly men of a certain vintage still wear sleeveless undershirts in public. Until Greenpoint's artsy sister neighborhood to the south, Williamsburg, set a brash example by surrendering to glassy condominium and hotel towers and urbane renewal that yanked the cost of shelter in a Manhattan-ish direction, vinyl-sided six-family tenements were the backbone of the housing stock here. And century-old trees shaded the crumbling sidewalks. But lately the biggest shadow being cast in Greenpoint belongs to Williamsburg. Vinyl siding doesn't represent Greenpoint's cachet any longer; virtual doormen, rooftop farms, artisanal gin and brick-faced condominiums do. The virtual gatekeeper is a prime amenity at the sold-out 93-unit Pencil Factory condominium on West Street, where the penthouse sold for just over $1 million, a neighborhood first. For young men, and for some young women, sculptured hair, baggy shorts and tattoos, not the clingy undershirt, are the new sartorial normal. Tomcats Barbershop, specializing in pompadour, punk and glam-rocker concoctions, and Hair Metal Salon (branching out from none other than Williamsburg) have arrived to coif the wired-in and amped-up young consumers who are the reason the neighborhood expects to build 7,300 new housing units by the end of 2013. No more bargain $8 haircuts, not even for dogs, though the local canines may have noticed the revamped sidewalks feel a tad smoother beneath their paws: gentrification is smoothing out all those hard edges. David J. Maundrell III, the president of aptsandlofts.com, the marketing agent for the 149 Huron Street Loft Condos (where perks include Brazilian teak finishes and a Zen garden), gazed approvingly at 200 Franklin Street, a two-story storefront that camouflages a set-back 12-story apartment tower jutting into the air like a solitary exclamation point. "This is what's coming to Greenpoint," he said. This is the future. The fully occupied tower was recently acquired for $12.45 million by a group that includes Miki Naftali, a former owner of the Plaza Hotel. Mr. Maundrell grew up in Greenpoint in an era "when making it in the world meant moving out to Ridgewood or Long Island" and the East River waterfront was accessible only by sneaking past the gargantuan warehouses on its banks and slipping under a chain-link fence. "Greenpoint's time has come," he said. Industry is gone and it's not coming back, and the waterfront is wasted as it is. The future seems to be invested in repurposing Greenpoint's 1.2 square miles of grit and quaintness. Especially seductive is its western waterfront, currently occupied by warehouses that block the panoramic Manhattan skyline views but already spoken for by a slew of developers who envision a chain of residential towers fronting a grassy esplanade along the East River. One of them, Benjamin R. Bernstein of RedSky Capital, even built a pier at the base of the India Street property his firm controls so that the city-sponsored East River Ferry could add Greenpoint to its itinerary: 18 minutes to Manhattan! Further justification for Amanda Burden's mantra about water's being the sixth borough of the city. Besides two luxury waterfront towers currently navigating the city's approval process, Mr. Bernstein's Greenpoint portfolio includes 100 apartments and 15 condominium units. On the commercial side, he is installing a Sleepy's franchise at Manhattan and Meserole because, thinking ahead, he figured, "Hey, when the residential thing blows up, everybody's going to need mattresses." Mr. Bernstein predicts that Greenpoint's residential waterfront quay will ultimately stretch for approximately 13 blocks: "It's going to be bigger than Williamsburg, it's going to dwarf Dumbo, and be twice the size of the Long Island City waterfront, like a massive version of the West Village waterfront. It's going to be nothing like Hoboken: it's going to be really cool.