New owners of beloved Bellefonte antique store ‘over-the-moon excited’ for reopening

When The Great Mish Mosh owners Karen and Les Urbanski announced their retirement nearly two months ago, they made it clear that they wanted the store’s new owners to keep it as an antique shop — and they’ve finally found the right people to do it.

Mary and Mike Pritchard were announced as the antique shop’s new owners in mid-April, and since then, the duo has been working hand in hand with the Urbanskis to make the place their own.

The store, located at 128 S. Allegheny St. between Smith and Front and The Print Factory, has been closed to allow for an ownership transfer to be completed. But its new owners are eager for it to officially reopen on Friday.

“Mike and I are over-the-moon excited to get things going at the Mish Mosh,” Mary Pritchard told the CDT Tuesday. “Our goal is to carry on with how Karen and Les left it, because you have to remember, Karen worked here before they owned it, and it would be an awful disservice to them to just all of a sudden destroy their life’s work.”

She continued, “It’s like when you buy a house, you don’t go in and just immediately raze it to the ground unless you’ve bought a jalopy, and this store is certainly no jalopy — it’s a staple here in Bellefonte, and we want it to remain as such.”

With her bubbly personality and unbridled enthusiasm for the Mish Mosh, one might mistake Pritchard for devout customer and Bellefonte native who’s had her eyes on the antique shop for years, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

The Pritchards moved to the borough from Washington state less than a year ago, and it wasn’t with the intention of investing in an antique shop. They moved because Mike Pritchard works for Philips Ultrasound Inc., which recently relocated its Bothell, Washington operations to Reedsville.

With the exception of getting the local lingo down, the Pritchards have had little difficulty adjusting to the new area, and Mary Pritchard has found ample opportunities to stoke her passion for antique and vintage goods.

‘I’m that person who purchased her first antique when I was 10 years old, and I’ve had a love for it ever since,” she said. “I’m very sentimental about the antiques we have at our home too, and my husband is the same way. We have a lot of family pieces at home, and there are some really great stores in the area — the Mish Mosh especially.”

After an eventful first trip to the store, which resulted in the new Bellefonte resident forgetting where she parked her car after purchasing some heavy antiques, Pritchard fell in love with it. She decided that she wanted to invest in the shop when she saw the Urbanski’s retirement Facebook post in early March.

Pritchard also said that her mother’s death roughly a year ago had contributed to her wanting to invest in the store, as it left her with a large hole inside that needed filling.

“I was really lost when my mom passed, so I went to my doctor here and told her that I was feeling that way,” Pritchard said. “The doctor said, ‘Mary, you need to find a purpose,’ so after that I decided to look for one, and when I saw that Facebook post, I knew that the Mish Mosh was the purpose that I was looking for.”

While the Pritchards intend on keeping the Mish Mosh as an antique store, they are looking to implement some slight changes, starting with the transformation of the second floor into a place where vendors can sell their goods. The first floor will sell items that the Pritchards display, and remain relatively untouched by the ownership change.

One of the second floor vendors will be Karen Urbanski, who will display her collection of jewelry, which includes brooches, earrings, necklaces, bracelets, rings and more. Urbanski also told the CDT in March that she’ll be selling her jewelry at various pop-up events around the area, too.

“It was very important to me that Karen stayed here — she’s become a figure in this community and I cherish the relationships she’s made in town here,” Pritchard said. “We want this to remain a community space, a place where the community can come, to smile and enjoy themselves, and some unique goods too.”

In addition to the second floor changes, Pritchard would also like to expand the store’s hours. For now, it will continue to operate from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sundays, and from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. all other days.

“I feel like if I have vendors, other human beings, trying to make a living out of this space, I owe it to them to have a little bit of an expansion to the hours,” Pritchard said. “Those changes will likely be implemented around the early days of June.”

For more information about The Great Mish Mosh’s new owners, its to-be-updated hours and the store itself, visit its Facebook page or www.thegreatmishmosh.com.