Carly Pippin had long imagined opening an antique shop in Santa Barbara. As a child, she made day trips from Westlake Village with her family, often stopping at Lewis & Clark, a longtime antique store in La Arcada Plaza. “That was always one of our favorite shopping destinations,” she mused.
Now, the setting has become something like a loop closing on itself. On May 7, Pippin opened her own shop, aptly named Pippin, just around the corner from Lewis & Clark.
“When I moved to Santa Barbara two years ago, it felt like this was the place and this was the time,” she shared, sitting opposite me in her new store. “It’s such a magical city, and it’s so community-oriented — I thought a retail shop might survive here.”
Inside, Pippin is a tightly curated mix of home goods — both new and old — alongside art and antiques: Italian doors with weathered paint, late-1800s painted panels from Florence, and 19th-century works sourced in France and Italy. She also carries contemporary paintings by artists, including Santa Barbara’s Michael Vilkin and Newport Beach’s Zoe Hadley.
Smaller objects — pillows, pots, books, and chairs — fill the space, creating a layered, collected effect reminiscent of a very cool, impossibly stylish grandmother’s home. The overall vibe leans distinctly shabby chic, and prices span a wide range — a deliberate choice, Pippin said, to keep the shop accessible. As she noted, “I think everyone deserves something beautiful.”
Pippin brings an unusually institutional background to an antique space. After college, she worked at the Smithsonian’s Freer and Sackler Galleries in Washington, D.C., galleries focused on Asian art, and even had the opportunity to visit the Smithsonian’s storage vaults to view conserved paintings. She later spent about seven years at the Getty in Los Angeles in Brentwood, working in close proximity to collections and curatorial teams.
“I love being surrounded by objects that have a story to them,” she said.
Some of her more unique items in Pippin are the student sketchbooks she found at a Parisian market. The notebooks, more than a century old, are filled with detailed drawings that are still remarkably intact. Though she sells some of the drawings, she admits that she hesitates to part with her favorites.
Pippin hopes the shop will evolve into something more than a retail space: a kind of informal gathering place. “Where people can gather and be a part of a community and exchange ideas,” she said. “Almost like a traditional French salon — art, philosophy, people coming together to have meaningful discussions. That’s what we need more than ever.”
Pippin hopes her store can be a special space for antique-lovers and the antique-curious alike. Above all, she emphasized that Pippin is “a space that’s for everybody.”
Pippin is located at 1114 State Street, #24, and is open every day from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. except Tuesdays, and 12 to 5 p.m. on weekends. For more information, see pippinhome.com or check out @pippinsantabarbara on Instagram.
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