The Chainlink

I made it down to the west loop for orch a little early and the name of this place caught my eye. I had to get closer to find out what the heck it was, because for all the world it looked like a muffler shop from down the block.

They were technically already closed but they let me look around.

As a kid, our family recreation centered around heading out to the newest enclosed shopping mall (my mom was heavily into retail therapy) and I've done some serious work on casting off my consumerist upbringing, but I still have my guilty pleasures . . .

One of them is anything resembling a garden center or aquarium store . . . in the seventies there were a handful of fairly spacious pet stores scattered around which featured a few huge tanks, and actual indoor ponds.  I think Scott's in Westchester still fills this bill, and I visited one such in Milwaukee a few years ago, and Chicago Pond and Aquarium at Winnemac and Clark had some wonderful pond installations, but for the most part these kind of stores are a thing of the past. I used to like being dragged to Pier One Imports because the aquarium sections tended to be pretty decent. Would rather have spent a day at any of these shops than at Disneyland or Great America.

Anyways, the place I stopped into tonight was not a pet store, but it evoked that same magical fairlyland feel as the places I described above.

Who can guess what it was?

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Yay for Beer Gardens!

I've been by it many times. It looks cool.

I didn't know they moved again. I haven't been there since they were on a dead end street off cortland and the kennedy.

If I ever opened an Aquarium store I would call it "Age of Aquariums" and make it look all '60sish

 

MUST check out the inside. Aisles and isles of supplies for beer brewing, coffee roasting, organic and hyrdoponic gardening; all sorts of flasks and beakers and labratory equipment (I'm watching Breaking Bad currently so all I could think about was "Meth Lab."  And all sorts of UV-heavy lighting everywhere (I seem to be attracted to it like a moth to a flame.)

S.Presley said:

I've been by it many times. It looks cool.

+1

Davo said:

If I ever opened an Aquarium store I would call it "Age of Aquariums" and make it look all '60sish

 

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