It's the time of the year when every sidewalk turns into a pine-tree graveyard and the shop windows still decorated with snowflakes look pathetic, not festive. It's a time for holiday things to be wrapped in paper, and for that overhang we've been nurturing all December to shrink.
The holiday season needs to go. Unless you're the Tell Tale Preserve Co.'a holiday pop-up shop, which is free to stay in Potrero Hill as long as it wants. Launched at the beginning of December, the Tell Tale Trunk Show looks as much an extension of the Big Daddy's antique store hosting it as a display for William Werner's pastries, confections, and preserves.
For a one-month seasonal shop, the place is gorgeous, as if a little piece of Portland broke off and floated down the coast, or as if Paxton Gate had branched into interior decoration. "I think we are here through January," Werner now says. "We finally finished painting the chalkboard wall at the end of December, so we figured we might as well roll it out for another month. It's been really fun."
It's quite a few months now since Tell Tale's space on Maiden Lane was
originally supposed to open. The pastry chef says that historical
preservation issues, Union Square's ban on holiday construction, and
other issues keep pushing opening day back.
In order to keep his
production kitchen busy (he's paying rent on it, after all), Werner has
placed pastry cases in a couple of cafes, launched a monthly
subscription series that now ships around the nation, and started a
twice-weekly farmers' market stand. Stocking an extra shop can't take that much more effort, can it?
