The Evolution Store

Brian has been searching the internet lately, cataloging a list of unique places for us to visit in the city. A couple weeks ago, he got so excited when he found The Evolution Store. We decided to visit it the very next Saturday.

The Evolution store is located on Spring St in SoHo. We decided to take the 6 train so we could see another sight on our bucket list. At the end of the 6 line there is an abandoned subway station -- the city hall stop.  It was built in 1904 and closed in 1945 because it was so close to the busier Brooklyn Bridge stop, and its curving platform left an overly large and dangerous gap in between its edge and the subway cars. Passengers would get hurt falling through the gap, or wouldn't even be able to reach the platform from the cars. In the end they shut the stop down instead of trying to fix it.

We rode the 6 train to the end of the line, and stayed on after all the other passengers got off. The train then started forward again, driving through the city hall station and through the looping end of the tunnel to turn around.  It was very dark out of our subway car's window, but we still got a glimpse of the station lit dimly by lights from our train and the overhead skylight as we passed by. What we saw surprised us. The station is quite ornate and contains beautiful brickwork, tile work, and windows. There was no way for us to get a picture because of the lack of light, so I found some pictures online.

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We couldn't tell what colors the bricks were when we saw it, so it was fun to see these pictures of it all lit up. It's a beautiful station and quite a shame that it's still not in use.

We stayed on our train and rode back up to Spring St where we got off, all ready for the next part of our adventure. 

We emerged above ground in the heart of SoHo. For those of you not that familiar with Manhattan, it is divided up into different neighborhoods -- east village, upper west side, lower east side, etc. Each of these areas have their own distinct feel and are known for different things. SoHo is one such neighborhood (SoHo being short for south of Houston St) and it has an artsy feel to it. It's located in lower Manhattan, where the streets are narrower, and many made of rectangular cobblestones. We just love the feel of this part of the city.

Along our walk from the subway station to the store, we made the mistake of making eye contact with a lady standing outside of her salon. She was giving away free packets of lotion, so I accepted one, and then before we knew it we were inside and I was receiving a demonstration of her diamond powder moisturizing face cream. We usually are good at ignoring people's attempts to lure us inside for a sales pitch, but somehow didn't escape this one. After applying an exfoliating cream and then the diamond cream to one of my forearms,  she compared it to my other forearm and said "look, you can just see the difference." Except we couldn't. She asked Brian if he could tell/feel a difference and he replied truthfully, that both my arms looked/felt the same. I started laughing. She was nice and didn't try to pressure us into purchasing anything after we said we weren't interested. Usually, once you get stopped, you can't get away! The rest of the day, I kept holding my diamond treated arm out to Brian and asking him to just feel the difference. :) 

After being waylaid, we made it to the store, a cute little black-brick building squished between two taller buildings.

The items on display in the store windows told us that this was going to be a fun place to visit. The evolution store carries all types of natural history items including entomological, paleontological, and anthropological merchandise. 

As we walked in, our eyes were drawn to the giant moose head hanging on the wall above the cash register. 

The bottom, main floor of the store is very long and narrow. The center of the room was open for guests to walk up and down. The room's walls were covered with shelves that sat behind waist-high glass counters. An eclectic mix of merchandise overflowed on the many shelves, and inside and on top of the counters. It was very crowded with customers, and we had to wind through the crowd as we slowly made our way to the back of the store while trying to look at everything.

Every inch of wall space not occupied with shelves was covered with hanging merchandise. Colorful posters available for purchase lined the ceiling, adding to the store's cramped and over-stuffed feeling. 

There was so much to look at, all of it really interesting, so it was hard to focus on one thing at a time. This giant crab framed in a shadow box was impressive -- it had to be at least three feet wide. I looked at Brian and knew exactly what he was thinking before he licked his lips and said that it made him hungry. 

On a shelf below the crab, Brian noticed this saber tooth tiger skull. It really made an impression on him because when I later asked what one thing he would buy if he had an unlimited budget, this is what he chose. Those are some impressive canine teeth!

Brian also really liked this stuffed penguin in a glass dome. 

They had all sizes of alligator heads, including smaller ones for only $20. I thought they were really cool and decided that this is what I would get if I were to buy anything. I thought my dad and brothers would really like one, so maybe we'll come back here when we do our Christmas shopping.

Here is Brian holding a small turtle shell and an alligator head. He's trying to decide which one he likes better.

Behind the alligator heads, were glass jars full of various animal skulls. They had coyote, muskrat, raccoon, skunk, and mink skulls.

I thought the muskrat skulls were intriguing with their orange teeth. Did you know that a muskrat's incisors, like other rodents, never stop growing? Their incisors rub against each other in such as way as they chew that they act like chisels that continually sharpen and shorten themselves. The orange coloring is a special layer of enamel that is extra hard. My brothers and brother-in-law Scott trap muskrats and mink and occasionally beaver.

Here is a coyote skull just for fun. It was cool to see how its teeth sit in its jaw.

On the other side of the room they had glass cases full of freeze dried hamsters, mice, and chipmunks. We laughed when we noticed the facial expression of the white and brown one in the front. 

Cute little chipmunks. I love chipmunks. We just saw a live one when we visited Mesa Falls in Idaho.

We both thought that the animal skeletons were fascinating -- and they had a lot of them of all types of animals.

Domestic cat skeleton.

In case skeletons aren't your thing, they also have whole animals and various animal parts still intact -- like bird feet and wings.

 

They also had a whole section at the back of the main floor that displayed human skeletons and skulls. The store belongs to the Association of Applied Paleontological Sciences and gets their human bones from the same sources that museums use. It was still kind of weird to see genuine human skeletons and skulls for sale. These carved skulls were in a case next to the bird wings. I'm not sure if they are genuine human skulls or not, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were. The carvings were beautiful, but I don't like the idea that they appear on human skulls.

After sufficiently touring the bottom level, we realized that there was a whole second floor. We walked up the narrow staircase, looking at the frame freeze-dried bats hanging on the wall as we passed.

At the top of the stairs this shadow box full of various preserved crab and lobsters caught our eye. It is kind of cool, but I don't think I would want it hanging in my living room.

We found more human skeletons upstairs. I always find human skeletons so fascinating, especially since we were able to visit the "Bodies" exhibit a couple years ago while it was open down at the south street seaport. 

There was a bit of a circus sideshow feel to the upper floor in that we found a few pieces with biological rarities. They had a calf with two heads, but the weirdest/saddest thing we found was this skeleton of conjoined twins that shared a body. They also had another similar skeleton where the figures shared a head and had two separate bodies. 

They had painted and plain ostrich eggs. The plain ones were set out in a bowl on a table and we got to pick one up and hold it. Ostrich eggs are huge and the shells are surprisingly thick. I was so excited when we saw these painted ones because Brian and I had just discovered the art of egg tempura painting not too long ago. They draw on the egg with wax to block out sections and then dye the uncovered portions. By adding and removing layers of wax, they can create colorful, intricate patterns that are so beautiful. There are lots of videos online of tempura painting and it is so fascinating to watch. This video shows a lady painting chicken eggs. It was fun to get to see some painted eggs first hand.

There were more animal heads on the second floor including this zebra and wildebeest -- just in case you want something a little more exotic hanging on your wall.

I couldn't decide if I liked the moose or this buffalo better. Either one would be too big for our apartment, but it would sure make a great conversation piece! 

After we left the store, we decided to walk over to Chinatown to visit our favorite dumpling place, Prosperity Dumpling. It was nice to be out and about enjoying the city, especially since the day was overcast and the temperature quite pleasant.

 

On our way we walked by a paper shop that had a beautiful window display. One item in their window was this drawing of birds found in central park.

Just down the street we found this very bright and colorful and abstract mural. You never know what you will find in Manhattan.

We crossed through Little Italy with its plethora of Italian restaurants lining the street. The air smelled of basil, tomatoes and warm crusty bread. It was all a bit pricey, and we quickened our step to get away from the scents that were making our mouths water and stomachs rumble.

Prosperity Dumpling didn't disappoint (it never does) and we ate our container of dumplings and sesame pancake with slices of beef and pickled carrots at a nearby park while we did some people watching. There was a group of Asian women playing some sort of card game at a nearby table and lots of people sitting around reading newspapers or just enjoying the weather. The perfect end to another NYC adventure.