We recall sitting on Santa's lap at the old Emporium store on the site, roughly, of
Bloomies. It seemed grand: elves in tights, plywood candy-cane cutouts.
Thursday on Potrero Hill a different kind of grand is stirring, as Tell Tale Preserve Co.'s William Werner launches a new boutique inside Big Daddy Antiques, a four-month-old home shop at 17th Potrero. Big Daddy owner Shane Brown says he's designing the 1,000-square-foot space-within-a-space just for Tell Tale: a communal two-board table form the 1800s, scaffold walls, industrial lighting. "The look is organic industrial ― if you can call something that," Brown says. All the furniture will be for sale, and anyone wearing tights will most likely be a customer.
For his part, Werner says he'll be offering the kind of pastries and confitures he's been selling at Ferry Plaza, along with drip coffee (from both Sightglass and Coffee Bar, which serves up Mr. Espresso) and his $35 Society bags. But, Werner says, working indoors will give him the chance to offer more delicate items he says he's to nervous to sell outdoors. By the way, Werner's December Society bag includes hazelnut, frankincense, and muscovado toffee and Douglas-fir-infused confiture au lait, i.e. milk jam ― all a hell of a lot fancier than the plastic-sheathed candy cane the Emporium elves were handing out. Santa, though, should look approximately the same ― Brown's invited one for Thursday's so-called trunk show launch. "He used to be the Santa for the Rockettes," Brown says.
The Tell Tale café will operate Mon.-Sat. till Christmas, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. After that, both Brown and Werner say, who knows? Tell Tale just might become a permanent Big Daddy's fixture.
Tell Tale Preserve Co. Trunk Show Launch
When: Thu., Dec. 9, 8 a.m.-2 p.m.
Where: 1550 17th St. (at Wisconsin), 621-6800
Cost: Free; complimentary tastes of Tell Tale pastries and hot cider
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