Because there is always something to be thankful for…
Here’s the story of a Philadelphia antique shop that opened up on Halloween Day in 1985 and the thankful owners that allow us a glimpse into the dramatic world of curating antiques – and dreams.
You will inevitably hear this question at some point in the month of November:
“What are you thankful for?“
While some of our best responses may be about health, family, and life, sometimes the things we are thankful for are a bit more complex. Some things are just difficult to put into words.
These things may not have occurred in one single instance but perhaps took place over an extended period of time. They might encompass various people and places. They may have even evolved; having once been only elusive wishes and dreams.
Living in a time when the present may seem daunting and the future uncertain, our opinions about life often vacillate and change, and we have to wonder whether it’s possible to be consistently thankful for something…
This Thanksgiving, we travel back to Philadelphia in the year 1985, to explore 30 years of steady thankfulness.
On October 31, 1985, along the graffitied brick façade of an old synagogue, just off of South Street, hangs a sign – “Antiquarian’s Delight.” A sleek 1966 Cadillac hearse appropriately pulls up along side the building on this blustery Halloween day.
In what will become a ritual for the next decade, a hip young couple excitedly hop out of the hearse and pop open the covered trunk. They begin to unload a series of boxes and rush inside to tear at the contents of each. The young man unwraps an ornate gold leaf mirror, places it on a shelf, and steps back, beaming with pride. The young woman gingerly places a teacup on an eggshell-colored lace doily.
For hours they unpack and chat vividly as they pose and poise, angle and wrangle, each item into place. Today, after years of skillful dumpster diving, city scavenging, and impromptu sidewalk sales, these antique collectors have finally found a home for their business.
With everything in its place, just the way they want it, the young man exhaustedly drops into a chair. His bride follows suit and plops onto his lap. They stare silently across the room unaware of where life would take them. The young woman then suddenly leans in, her forehead touching his, both of their eyes close, and she whispers, “We did it.”
Fast forward 30 years. The couple, former art students, Anastacia Fahnestock and Scott Evans, are still together, relishing in the business of antiques. Long gone, but not forgotten, are the days of sidewalk sales and their “Opening Day” in the basement of the old synagogue flea market.
We first meet them at their new shop location on Bainbridge Street. Having settled here in 1994, Scott has had plenty of time to put his sculpting skills to use and make the shop his own. Outside, the exterior dons a fancy striped awning and the old tin that he fashioned together from a salvage yard, catches our eye.
“I remember those days,” Scott muses. “When we started it was an entirely different business. We were young. At that time, there were mostly older people doing it. Now, those people are not around and we are the old people. When we first moved here, this street was desolate. There was nothing here. It was deserted. All the places on this corner were empty. Sometimes, we were even afraid to park our car on this street. We took a leap of faith by staying here. Then one day everything just grew around us. We were very lucky because things could have gone the other way. We are grateful. I still walk in here everyday and am surprised at how it all turned out. I couldn’t have imagined it like this…” Scott’s eyes glaze over with the all too familiar hue of nostalgia and we recognize it as our cue to enter the shop.
Today, the street is very busy. Lined with restaurants, art galleries, and shops, people flood the streets in search of something that appeals to them. With its door propped open, the golden lights pouring out onto the sidewalk, soft haunting music, and an imposing front desk, one can’t help but be drawn to Anastacia’s Antiques.
Inside, the 12 foot ceilings immediately draw your eyes up. Clearer now, the music plays on like a soundtrack for what you are about to experience. A glass-enclosed seasonal display cabinet to our left features a large taxidermied turkey, a sign that Anastacia and Scott make an effort to stay current and relevant with each season. The original solid pine floors beneath our feet creak and bellow as we make our way through the shop.
We veer right as we enter, past the 19th Century American-made silent ventriloquist dummies that seem to jeer and cackle behind our backs, and are immediately transported, to an old Hollywood hotel perhaps, with ornate chandeliers and intricate parlor chairs.
Further back, we find ourselves in a circus sideshow with Rubber Boy and Alligator Girl.
We venture off to the eerie land of “Dead Souls” where chain whips and devilish masks threateningly dangle from the wall.
We spend some time in a country cabin smelling of pine and cedar.
We explore a cathedral with saintly statues watching our every move.
We run through the halls of our very own castle.
We dance before a mirror and play dress-up with clothes and jewelry overflowing from an old trunk.
We become doctors and investigate medical impossibilities and oddities.
We sit at a desk and write post cards to old friends and lovers.
In this shop, we can be anyone and do anything…
As we make our way back around to the front desk, we spot Anastacia, teaching a customer about the different types of jewels. Her hands work nimbly as she sews a patch onto a piece of lace, but our attention is elsewhere. “These are my favorite jewels…” she explains as she gestures toward a glass case containing various colorful stones. We look past her and watch as curious guests enter the shop with the customary gasp and upward glance.
As Scott tends to the new guests, we take a moment to congratulate Anastacia on the 30th anniversary of their shop. She looks away modestly and chuckles. “Oh! And to think this all started because I needed money to take out my wisdom teeth!” She calls it “Urban Archeology” and explains that Scott was great at finding treasures in unexpected places.
“Scott was the best trash picker,” she says unabashedly. “This was in the early ’80s. He’d go around the neighborhood and find all these neat things and we would sell them at sidewalk sales. We’d put up posters everywhere and we’d advertise that way. We soon became known for our sales and once we were established at the flea market, we started buying our own things.”
We ask what she is thankful for after 30 years in business. She exhales and speaks with deep-rooted passion. “I am forever grateful that I get to do what I love. Not having to compromise myself…it makes things fresh and exciting. Everyday, I wake up and look forward to work. I end up meeting different types of people. Not just customers, but family members who are selling their loved one’s things; who are just looking for the right venue to keep their loved one’s memory alive. I am the liaison for finding the right person to pass it on to. That’s important to me because sometimes these things are just sold at an auction or even thrown in the trash.”
She’s also a big history buff and is particularly interested in Philadelphia’s past.
“Philadelphia is traditional but also very industrial. It’s history is so robust and I’m glad that, in some small part, I get to keep that alive. There is such a variety of wealth in Philadelphia’s history. It’s always been so heavily populated so there is so much to be found here. I love that you can have the ‘everyman’ stuff like rolling pins and mixing bowls – that stuff has so much spirit – but you can also find the gilded-age stuff like cast bronze and cherubs. I like handling everything that comes from Philadelphia because it’s like cultivating the tapestry that makes up this city.”
As an art student, the possibilities for her to create art were endless. So why did Anastacia choose a profession in nostalgia?
She humors us and isn’t at all stuffy or pretentious about it. Instead, her response is almost dreamy and sounds a bit like something a hopeless nostalgic would say. “Old stuff has such integrity. It has history. It’s like a window to the past.”
From one nostalgic to another, I feel comfortable enough to share with her how my imagination ran wild as I walked through the shop. She giggles, but before I could run away embarrassed, her eyes widen and, almost as if it was a magical secret that only a select few were entitled to know, she whispers “It’s like a wonderland.” She blushes and we can’t help but lean in wanting to hear more. “It’s almost like theatre. It’s so much fun trying to create a theatrical space and an experience. There’s a harmony to our decorating. Scott and I have similar tastes so everything just works together. But there is more to it than just being in the shop 7 days a week…”
Just then Scott appears from behind the maze-like wall he created in the center of the shop. “Yes, what you see is the end result of all the other work we do. The part you see is the small part of the job.” He graciously offers to give us a behind-the-scenes tour of how the magic happens. Besides, what would a theatrical experience be without a “backstage.”
Scott escorts us through a beaded curtain and down the stairs to a basement as massive, yet thoughtfully organized, as the shop itself. The basement is a labyrinth of rooms dedicated to storing tiles, frames, lamps, doorknobs and other hardware.
Scott calls it his “workshop.” He explains “This is just one section. We have an office, a sewing room, an electric wiring room, and a wood shop. We do it all. Just the two of us.”
Scott agrees that it is a lot of work for two people to take on. We ask, if after 30 years in business, he is ready to slow down. His response is nothing short of inspirational…
“All I ever wanted was something of my own…to make something. We are creative people. We wanted to make something of ours. We didn’t have grand aspirations to be famous. We just wanted to create something that would care of us in the future. I was inspired by the sculptor, Claes Oldenburg, and his idea of The Store in the 1960s. He opened a store in New York City, where he and his artist friends would sell whatever pop art they were making that day. It was art, but retail. I wanted that. I wanted to have a place where you can decide to make whatever you want as long as people would eventually buy something. As long as people respond to whatever we procure, it gives us the energy to keep doing it. Thirty years – that’s a long time, but I continue to enjoy getting up every morning and doing it. It’s all we ever wanted…”
We make our way back upstairs and Scott rushes off to tend to another customer. Just then, Anastacia returns and pulls us aside with a sense of urgency. She points to Scott, makes direct eye contact with us, and with a slight crack in her voice utters “I couldn’t do it without him.” Right then, we knew that if there was one thing we should remember about our visit, it should be that…the common thread, from the very beginning and the thing that they are most thankful for – aside from being able to live out their dreams every day – is that they have each other.
Every half hour, a cuckoo clock echoes throughout the shop. We’ve been so transfixed these past 4 hours, that we only now seem to hear it for the first time. Suddenly, feeling like Cinderella rushing out at midnight, we say our goodbyes,. But even as we leave the shop, with the golden glow of the lights trailing behind, the magic of Anastacia’s Antiques follows.
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