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Uploaded: Thursday, January 17, 2013, 10:22 PM
New downtown shop sells Mountain View's charm
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by Daniel DeBolt
Mountain View Voice Staff
Photo
 | Mountain View might not be a San Francisco or New York, but apparently the place has enough charm for a tiny souvenir shop. It opened downtown Thursday, and sells mostly T-shirts.
Owner Tina Ambrogi said she was inspired to rent the vacant shop at 705A West Dana St., previously a saltwater taffy store, after she learned there were no Mountain View T-shirts available and decided to design her own.
"I was just going to start peddling them out at the farmers market," Ambrogi said. "Then I saw that this place had a for rent sign in it about month ago so I figured, 'Why not? I'll just open up a store and sell the shirts.'"
She's got plans to sell more soon, such as postcards, calendars, posters, local art work, baby clothes and pet-related products.
Her T-shirt designs include a play on Google's search engine, with the words "Mountain View" in place of the Google logo and the words, "We have what you are searching for," in the query box.
A Google-themed shirt seemed perfectly fitting to Ambrogi. When people ask where Mountain View is, "I say, 'It's where Google is,' and they go, 'Ok.'"
Another shirt is inspired by the logo from the city's 1950s downtown movie theater and there's one inspired by a street sign with the city's population on it.
Ambrogi has an apparent interest in the city's history, with shelves made from orchard crates, local history book for sale and a poster on the wall she found on Ebay illustrating the location of the city's most popular businesses and buildings in the 1980s. She wants to reproduce historical images on calendars, posters and postcards.
"I'm calling it the General Store so I'm not limited to what I can sell in here," Ambrogi said. "It's going to be ever-changing and hopefully grow into something pretty cool."Are you receiving Express, our free daily e-mail edition? See a sample and sign-up for Express.
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| Comments
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Posted by Mark, a resident of the Shoreline West neighborhood, on Jan 18, 2013 at 10:35 am Nice! I live nearby and plan to check it out ... hope the t-shirts are 100% cotton and come in gray and/or black ... I'm sure I'll leave the store with a few postcards, a t-shirt or two, and maybe a couple of keychains if there are any available ... good luck to you Tina!!!
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Posted by Donna McCord, a resident of the Cuesta Park neighborhood, on Jan 18, 2013 at 2:35 pm Nice! I look forward to its opening! It will be great to have a place like this to shop in downtown Mountain View!
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Posted by Heidi, a resident of the Shoreline West neighborhood, on Jan 18, 2013 at 6:35 pm I purchased a t-shirt there on Thursday. Love it!
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Posted by Sean, a resident of the Sylvan Park neighborhood, on Jan 18, 2013 at 7:01 pm You should make a shirt that says Sunnyvale Sucks! with a picture of the city logo on it. I would rock it.
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Posted by Sparty, a resident of the Gemello neighborhood, on Jan 18, 2013 at 8:06 pm There was a taffy shop downtown?
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Posted by shaun, a resident of another community, on Jan 18, 2013 at 8:13 pm As a Sunnyvale resident, I second sean's suggestion.
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Posted by Garrett, a resident of another community, on Jan 19, 2013 at 10:42 am Nice. T shirts, hope you come with great ideas for shirts.
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Posted by justice4all, a resident of the The Crossings neighborhood, on Jan 19, 2013 at 9:12 pm Is there going to be a "Free Wo'O" shirt?
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Posted by sEan, a resident of the Sylvan Park neighborhood, on Jan 20, 2013 at 9:58 am nobody likes Beethoven bro, or at least it won't sell well.
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Posted by sandy, a resident of another community, on Jan 22, 2013 at 2:42 pm remember the shirts that said:
London
Paris
Rome
"your City name here"
Can you make some of those???
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Posted by Chris, a resident of the Shoreline West neighborhood, on Jan 24, 2013 at 8:49 pm This is such a unique idea. No other town that I know of has a store just about their town.
I'll be buying a shirt for sure.
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Posted by DC, a resident of the North Whisman neighborhood, on Jan 25, 2013 at 8:44 pm Hope it does better than the Tape store. Yes there was a Taffy store. We also have a Safe /lock store / museum.
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