New furniture store has retro twist

Gordon Main and Marty Prinsep with some of the more unusual items at the new store on Walton St. Photo / Michael Cunningham

It was the unusual three-wheeled contraption on the footpath that brought the Advocate snooping around the new Whangarei furniture store where new tenants have moved into the old National Bank site in the CBD.

The camera dolly was used during the 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch and who knows, may even have shouldered the equipment that captured Northlander Wendy Brown creating her 400m sprint record.

Passers-by may also do a double take on the name of the store - John St Traders which is not on John St at all, but very much on the corner of Robert and Walton Sts.

Marty Prinsep, of Tamaterau, bought John St Traders in January, the one actually on John St, but has expanded into a second store which opened its doors last week.

The interior designer and furniture dealer, originally from Auckland, says he has confidence in Whangarei's demand for quality, low-cost furniture.

Gordon Main, who ran the original John St Traders and has been part of the CBD furniture for a number of years, has remained on site as a buyer for Prinsep.

Prinsep bought the camera dolly from a Christchurch dealer and Main reckons in his decades of furniture dealing, it was by far the most bizarre item he had seen.

The store is also home to some other pieces of quirkiness - three steel film reel cases which carried 20th Century Fox and Warner Brothers movies and were shipped between the US, New Zealand and Australia. "They had to be made of steel as the reels had a habit of self-combusting," says Prinsep.

A gigantic globe towers above the beds which peer out on to Robert St.

"I found that on Trade Me. It was from a travel agent from the 1960s. I'd love to know where, though."

A Victorian luggage trolley full with vintage suitcases has also found a home among the mix of beds, benches, sofas and bedside cabinets. "Vintage furniture adds a sense of history to your home. It's also something that is part of that 50-year cycle of appreciation."

He says retro furniture is more popular with Aucklanders, but Whangarei buyers knew good quality pieces when they saw them.

The new store carries classic and contemporary, high-end furniture including solid oak pieces.