You know that sweet idea you had last year to open a vintage boutique inside an Airstream trailer in Fayetteville?
Too late. Someone beat you to it.
The culprit’s name is Molly Clark, a local lover of vintage, and avid thrift store shopper who opened her new store, Grey Dog on Tuesday inside a newly-rennovated, 1973 Airstream trailer located on College Avenue.
Molly, a graduate from UT Austin’s fashion merchandising program who has experience remodeling houses in south Fayetteville, purchased the Airstream with the intention of turning it into a small studio or apartment. She’d also collected lots of one-of-a-kind vintage items on a recent trip abroad, and planned to open a small store showcasing her collection.
Inside Grey Dog
“I’ve always wanted to have a vintage boutique, but when we started looking for a location, I couldn’t find a space that I loved,” Clark told us. “So we decided to gut the Airstream, and turn it into a boutique. I’m really glad we did.”
The store is small, but the space is filled with unique pieces of jewelry, clothing, shoes, and other vintage finds Clark has collected, and in many cases, improved upon, over the years.
“Seventy five percent of the things here have been altered, whether it be the hem line or the sleeve length, but I try to moderize the looks,” Clark said. “It’s something that I do with my own vintage. Usually something needs to be tweaked a little so it doesn’t look dated.”
Clark and her business partner Josh Wilson, who had also worked together on remodeling projects, teamed up to whip the trailer into retail shape along with some help from friends and family. The renovations took a lot of long nights, Molly said, but despite the challenge of working on the curved surface inside the Airstream, were completed in about six weeks.
“We’d done some renovations, but we never did anything like this,” Clark told us. “It was a challenge, but we just kind of figured it out.”
Clark plans to change out merchandise daily inside the small space to give people a reason to stop by often. Also, an ordinance that applies to businesses operating out of a trailer will require her to move around a bit, but that was fine with Molly.
“Sometimes I get a bit of wanderlust,” she said. “I’ll be stationed in Fayetteville, but it might be nice to travel a little bit.”
The store is currently located on the lot across from Lacuna Modern in Fayetteville, and will be open Monday through Friday from 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m., and on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
