10 posts tagged “antiques”
This is somewhat old news, but in case you haven't put together the pieces yet, it seems that two former Castro businesses have both reopened in a Victorian on 18th Street, across from Delano's.
The Eureka Barber Shop, which formerly serviced its mostly ursine clientèle in the large storefront at the corner of 19th and Collingwood, has now hung up its shingle (literally!) at 4222 18th Street. They are cutting hair up in the front parlor on the second story, and if you are passing by take a look up to see the most glamorous ceiling of any barber shop in the city. It's a traditional coved Victorian ceiling with ornate medallions and gold gilding. Faboo.
Interestingly, on weekends this house's driveway is also the site of a pretty involved yard sale, with some outlandish glassware, shiny jewelry, and naked-man statuary. If that product mix sounds familiar, it did to us too. And then we realized that the man doing the selling is the same guy who had the Black Cat antique store on 19th Street! The shop on 19th now houses Joe's Barbershop, and I always wondered what happened to the vast quantities of tchatchkes that used to line the Black Cat's windows.
Well, we have our answer now. The yard sale continues, and amazingly his product mix is seasonal to match the upcoming holiday. So there must be a lot of boxes in storage somewhere, or else he is still acquiring new stock from estate sales and the internet.
As a final note, the former home of the Eureka Barber Shop has been remodeled into Spunk Salon. Some messaging on the window references punk style, so it seems that they are targeting a more urban, funky, female audience. I like the copper doors, but somehow the storefront looks unfinished to me. Is more work (signs? paint?) coming to the exterior to polish the branding a little more? Let's hope. This corner has been the site of a succession of closed businesses, so they need to make a little more noise and live up to their name more if they want to survive.
A wrap-up of small items that have been knocking around my camera's memory card for a few weeks now:
- Razors has been open and razoring away for a couple weeks now. This is the former location of ENZI salon, which is now up the street a couple blocks. I'm told that the owner of Razors used to be at Joe's Barbershop before deciding to strike out on his own.
- The perpetual garage sale at 530 Castro Street -- only the name seems to change, and did the latest incarnation even have a name? -- has sharpied an update on its "Closing soon" sign that the end is coming "June 15th or Soon" (sic). Note that I first reported this eminent closing back in freakin' April, so "soon" is a relative term for these people.
- Remember the grease fire at All-Season Sushi & Bar (or as we called it, "All Season Sushi Bar and Grill")? A quick peak inside the place reveals that much more is going on in there than repairs to the kitchen. It seems that a full remodel is underway. This photo is from a couple weeks ago:
- The Cove cafe is entering the late-night food market by staying open until 2 on Friday and Saturday night. They still aren't taking reservations for the high-visibility, window-side "attention-whore" booths though, so be prepared to wait.
- Bazouzi market and deli at the corner of 18th and Eureka has posted a notice announcing a change of ownership. I'm told that the couple who own the place have finally decided to retire. According to the posted announcement, the new owners are renaming the place Adorabella's, which is further evidence that all good store names are taken.
- A sign up at Off the Beading Path at 18th and Douglass (and nextdoor to the new location of ENZI) advertises a store-wide liquidation sale. I don't know if this is an indication that the owner is picking up his beads and going home -- or possibly to Fisherman's Wharf where he recently opened another store -- but generally store-wide 25-50% discounts are not signs of a bright future.
- I wrote about the changes over at the-cafe-formerly-known-as-Philz, but at the time had forgotten the new name. Well, the building is repainted now and the new sign is up. Welcome Bean Here, Brew That!. (ref. My comments above about the name Adorabella's)
Some recent changes in signage in the Castrohood:
- SF MUNI has installed these new signs in the Castro underground station, and judging from the comments people have already been left, a lot of you don't like them. I actually like the font and the use of lowercase for the header words "castro" and "outbound," but the "Boarding Zone" looks like it was designed by an entirely different committee.
I wish they had installed signs like the ones that they have on train platforms in Japan, which give the names of the next station in either direction. Here's an example which I took from jpellgen's Flickr stream:
Not that our train system is so complicated, but when you are riding an unfamiliar line it is very comforting to know where you are headed next.
- And speaking of signs, DeLano's IGA has finally removed the outside Cala signs are replaced them with the new name:
Signs on the inside of the store have also been updated.
- Probably the best sign I've seen in a while is in the window of the yard-sale-like store which occupies the space which was Lot'sa Stuff which was Browser's Nook. According to signs in the window, right after the "big sale" this retail melange is "closing soon."
Although the store started out with a specialty in posters, its stock has been evolving and now funky peasant handbags, colorful scarves, and huge nativist wood carvings (no joke) fill the window. What is it about this space that only attracts these crazy, thrift-shop, do-it-yourself stores?
I'm never happy to see a store close because it seems like the closest you'll ever come to a physical manifestation of a person's dream being crushed, but sometimes a store comes along where you can't help but start the death watch immediately. These are the stores that make us repeat over and over again, "How do they stay in business?!"
An example of this is Eureka Gallery, the antique store near the corner of 18th Street and -- no, not Eureka Street -- Douglass Street. This storefront used to house a dry cleaner which moved up to Market Street and we had high hopes for a useful neighborhood store moving in, but since the space is so tiny we weren't sure what kind of business could generate the income in that confined space to pay rent. When the china cows and spangly chandelliers appeared in the window we just rolled our eyes. Yay. Another antique store.
In the owner's defense, the store is very nice looking, and improbably he had enough turnover to keep the front window display changing and interesting. But we still always scratched our heads about how he could sell enough to stay in business. Our theory was that he was selling on eBay as well, but in that case, why have the income drain of a storefront at all? Why not just have a website and sell out of your living room?
Maybe the owner came to that same conclusion as well, and now it's time to settle up the dead pool. Last week a sign went up in the window announcing that February 11 would be the final day, and that the stock would be clearanced out. I think the store was open just over a year.
So long Eureka. With you, The Black Cat, Browser's Nook, and the temporary Lot'sa Stuff gone, how will the aging neighborhood queens decorate their parlors?
Lot'sa Stuff, the store-cum-rummage sale on Castro Street where Browser's Nook used to be, has posted signs which indicate that, like a comet or Marilyn Monroe, its radiant streak across the Castro sky was bright but short-lived (and possibly on heroin). The above sign went up during the past week, and a new one graced it this weekend which proclaimed, "LAST DAY." Additionally, the piles of eponymous "stuff" in the store have thinned out considerably, and the place looks like it is emptying out again in preparation for a new, real tenant.
I shouldn't pick on these people and their dream so much, but the place really was a mess. I went in once to look at the book rack and was driven out by the overwhelming musk of dank mixed with bad life decisions. It was pretty amazing how they could take an empty, cleaned out space, and make it seem like it had been the home of mouldering piles of flotsam for generations, all within a week's time.
So we're back to the guessing game of what will move into this space. There isn't any sort of zoning which requires the business here to be random crap piled on ding'ed up furniture, does it?
I know I seem obsessed with the shop that sprouted toadstool-like in the spot where Browser's Nook was, but I can't help cringing at the missed possibilities there. Well, it seems that the former signage that went up was mostly correct, and the store is named Lotsa Stuff.
The name was on the first computer-printed signs, and it was confirmed on the hand-written sign posted to the right of the door in the photo above, except minus the extraneous apostrophe that had been between the "lot" and "sa." The big signs still trumpet "Collectibles" and "Antiques" but the hand-written sign concedes that the store also serves as a "flea market" of sorts.
Boding well for the life of the store, this ghastly four-foot statue in the window was already proudly proclaiming its status as "SOLD." I knew that statues prominently displaying boy-parts sell well in this neighborhood, but the speed of this sale surprised even me. Thank goodness it sold before another neighbor with small children demanded a tasteful kilt to be fitted over the statue's privates.
Note that the rental sign is also still up, giving hope that this is just a way for the landlord to clear out his basement while looking for a less musty tenant.
Update: The hand-written sign has changed, and the wayward apostrophe is back. So I guess the name is back to "Lot'sa Stuff".
The former Browser's Nook continues to fill up with detritus treasures, but sadly last week someone smashed the glass pane next to its front door. At first I thought it was another Halloween decoration, and fortunately it didn't break all of the way through the window.
I don't know the cause of the window-smashing, but I refuse to believe it was a robbery attempt because, well, have you seen the piles of flotsam in that place? It could have been a homeless guy with a rock, but I prefer to think that my blog has whipped roving bands of Castro gays into a frenzy, driving them to random acts of editorializing on the state of what passes for an antique in this town.
So, time for another update on the site formerly inhabited by Browser's Nook. As I mentioned, signs have gone up and a scene which I called reminiscent of "All in the Family" has appeared in the window.
Well, as more stuff has moved into the store, it seems that the comparison to a sitcom set was fairly apt. There now appears to be scenery left over from a high school theater production in the store, as well as random old furniture, bits of lamps and household items, and, well, trash.
Here's a close-up of a half-crushed can of Safeway Select diet Dr. Skipper on the floor, right smack dab in the middle of the window. Nice.
Also on the windows are more and larger signs, some of them even from a computer printer! The largest sign proclaims "LOT'SA (sic) STUFF" which frankly is seeming more and more like a threat.
I just passed the site of the former Browser's Nook, and handmade signs in the window proclaim "ANTIQUES" and "Opening Soon." There are also a selection of old furniture items in the window which look, well, old. Actually, it looks vaguely like they are reproducing the set of All in the Family.
There is also a smaller sign listing the name of what seems to be a real antique dealer, so it looks like this store might deal in items that are generally considered antiques and not just the hodgepodge of curiosities that other shops carry.
BTW, this opening of an antique store in the location where an antique furnishings store just folded carries on the time-honored Castro tradition of seeing a retail failure and attempting to reproduce it exactly. I believe that La Tortilla on Castro is the third Mexican restaurant in a row in that space, and LikeWise Cafe is the third coffeshop/cafe in that slot.
The Browser's Nook, just a couple of doors down from the recently closed Tully's at 530 Castro Street, has also called it quits. This store didn't go quite so suddenly -- its closing sale has been going on for a few weeks now, and each day there seemed to be fewer of the Nook's trademark armoires inside the store, and more out on the curb with handwritten discount signs.
Actually, it's not such a shock that this place is gone now. The store always seemed out of step with the rest of the neighborhood, and although the funkiness of the place will be missed, I don't know anyone who actually shopped there. You would think antiques would be an easy sell in the Castro, but somehow the Browser's Nook's stock never seemed as old or as interesting as the high prices would imply. Their big collection of oddly-shaped table lamps (frogs! penguins! turtles!) seemed to be the only thing which really clicked with the neighborhood, and maybe that's one of the few things which allowed the store to hold on so long.
Now the store is completely empty except for a couple of dirty carpets and a realtor's sign in the window. It's a fairly deep retail space so it would take a good sized business to fill this. Also, the property doesn't look to be in such good condition, so whoever moves in will probably have to shell out a fair bit for initial renovations. Finally, the space isn't food-ready, so any attempt to convert this into a restaurant or bar will be difficult. I did see someone in there today talking with what looked like a realtor, so maybe they've found a taker already.
