Hours after a water main burst and flooded an antique mall and coffee shop in Fridley, a building inspector on site gave owners Joshua Larson and David Wenzel grim news.
"This is the worst day of your life," Wenzel recalled the inspector saying as they stood in the muddy mess left after 12 to 18 inches of floodwater had receded.
Then, Wenzel said, the inspector had better news: "This could be the best day of your life, and transformational."
A month after the June 28 disaster that threatened to sink the business, the Wild Vintage Collective and the adjoining Clapping Monkey coffee shop are getting a fresh start. A grand reopening coinciding with the emporium's one-year anniversary in Fridley is set for Saturday. Doors will open at 11 a.m., and a "Christmas in July" celebration with a flea market and food trucks is planned in the parking lot.
"I'm very excited," said Nikky Peters, who runs Caposhi Vintage and is one of 40 dealers in the 18,000-square-foot building on the southwest corner of 73rd and University avenues. Peters lost a month of income, and is thrilled to get back to selling glassware, pottery and vintage clothing.
"It was scary at first," she said Friday while tidying up her rented space. "This is my main income. I spend a lot of time here. This place is amazing and has a good community vibe."
Wenzel and Larson, who are married, originally opened Wild Things Collective in Uptown in Minneapolis. They moved the business to Fridley a year ago when space opened up after a computer chip manufacturer moved out. Since then, Wild Things has attracted a big following. It logs more than 1,000 transactions per weekend, Larson said.
When news about the flood spread, dealers, customers and volunteers — including some who had never been to the mall — came to the rescue. They helped Larson and Wenzel salvage about 98% of the merchandise and move it to a nearby warehouse for storage.
