Meow’s Kathleen Schaaf buying vintage when downtown was empty–except for the secondhand stores

PHOTO by ROSHEILA ROBLES

It’s hard to believe today, with the new buildings like stents in the city’s heart—and the vacant lots with white plastic Redevelopment Agency fences around them—but in the late 1970s, downtown was one big thrift in many old buildings. The department stores were either about to bury themselves (Desmond’s, Middough’s Boys Shop) or were trudging grimly forward like out-of-style retail zombies (Walker’s, Woolworth’s). Until the city coughed up Long Beach Plaza, this was a thrift village—the name, in fact, of a thrift store next door to where Blue Cafe is now. (Vince Jordan, where you been?)

Kathleen Schaaf, owner of Long Beach vintage clothing store Meow—a beacon in the Fourth Street retro row since 1986—had the great good fortune to be in the right place at the right time. And, having the good sense to know it, she was at that place a lot.

“My arms hurt carrying the stuff, there was so much,” Schaaf says of the incredible booty she’d find in the 1970s when she was still a student at Los Alamitos High School. “I was the weird, odd girl in the 1940s cocktail dresses,” she says—but today, the vintage peep-toed platform shoe is on the other foot. Because Schaaf—and, one assumes, a few other cognoscenti—were first to be second, at a time when cast-off Bauerware from Long Beach Unified home economics classrooms was still at Goodwill for the taking. Those were the last few years when we’d ever look askance at Romeo-collared Sir Guy sport shirts, and those daddy-o pants with bellhop stripes inset in the outseam. Then Schaaf opened Meow—and while it was still an underground thing, we seemed to go instantly from not caring about the ’40s and ’50s to . . . not caring about the ’70s.

“It was 1986,” Schaaf says. “You could still find all that stuff in the thrift stores—photo-print polyester shirts? They were all over.” And shopping next to you? “Only poor people and hippies,” she says with a smile, remembering the scene. “No, not hippies.”

Benley: A Vietnamese Kitchen Schaaf likes the house salad for its dressing, a tangy mix of rice vinegar and fried garlic. She also recommends the pho—the traditional brothy Vietnamese soup with thinly sliced meat and lots of greens—and the pan-grilled salmon.

8191 E Wardlow Rd | Long Beach 90808 | 562.596.8130

Starling Diner The freshly squeezed orange juice is all sweetness and light, says Schaaf, and so are the scones: “They’re not gut-bombs.” And as for the Bloody Mary, “Does your Bloody Mary have a crab claw holding a tomato?” Uh, not as such.

4114 E Third St | Long Beach 90814 | 562.433.2041

Olives Gourmet Grocer This is the ideal grocery to stop by on your mad dash home and grab a tabouli, potato or macaroni salad at the last minute. Or, if you’re cooking from scratch, do what Schaaf does: “If I run out of something, I know I can run in and get some garlic or a sprig of mint,” she says.

3510 E Broadway | Long Beach 90803 | 562.439.7758

Long Beach Southeast Farmers’ Market All sunlit and Pacific Ocean-adjacent, this one’s a nice way to wake up on Sunday morning. Schaaf suggests making a lunch out of the gyros—the thinly sliced, mouth-wateringly grilled Greek meat sandwiches—and making friends with the adorable orphans at the Hearts for Hounds kiosk.

Alamitos Bay Marina East | Marina Dr, south of E Second St | Long Beach 90802 | Sun 9am-2pm

Tags: best of, kathleen schaaf, Long Beach, meow, olives, starling diner