CdA antiques store closes a chapter

The auctioneer’s voice could be heard out the open doors of the 18-year-old Wiggett Antique Mall and down the block.

Metal geese decoys, settled on at $50. A painted serving tray for $7.50.

And seated on roped-off stairs behind the milling crowd of bidders, the Gagnon family quietly watched the items cycle through. The auctioneer stood on a stepladder and moved from shelf to shelf, selling items and leaving the walls bare behind him. In a few days, the building will be empty, and work will apparently begin on a French restaurant in the mall’s place.

“I might come here to eat and see the old building,” said Jeffrey Gagnon, who runs the mall. “I’ll miss it. It’s been my home for 18 years. I’ll always recognize every squeak in the floor.”

Last weekend, the antique mall’s employees loaded up carts and moved from their 1928 brick building down two blocks on Fourth Street into the old Roxy Theater. There’s a new owner for the building, and there wasn’t any room for one of the city’s largest collections of antiques, Gagnon said.

“It’s sad to see it change so much,” he said. When the Wiggett Antique Mall opened 18 years ago, downtown Coeur d’Alene was practically a ghost town, Gagnon said. But recent development has exploded in the area, and times are changing for some of the smaller businesses that line Sherman Avenue and its side streets.

“We’ve been a little hurt by a North Idaho economy that’s rapidly changing. I’d say we’re victims,” Gagnon said. “It’s changing, and we’re doing what we can to change with it. We’re trying to adapt to the new downtown.”

The new downtown spelled doom to the Penny Candy store just down the block, owned by Steve Groner, who also owns the old Wiggett Antique Mall building. Penny Candy closed Nov. 14, after 14 years of operation; a pub is in its place now.

“We’re trying to fit into the new economy by trying to maintain the downtown’s high rate of living,” Gagnon said. The family looked for locations outside of downtown, but nothing seemed right.

“It’s nothing compared to the feeling you get when you’re downtown,” Gagnon said.

Their new location is a bit closer to Sherman Avenue, but the building is smaller and the rents are higher. The move has been a 45-day process that stretched the Gagnon family and antiques dealers to the limit. The entire Roxy Theater building had to be renovated before pieces could move in. Nothing broke on the trip down the block, Gagnon said.

But watching the items pass through the auction was almost a relief at this point, he said. The amount of work that went into the move has drained him.

“Today, we’re glad to be putting a period at the end of a long sentence.”