Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

I noticed the other evening that this florist, on Two Notch near Spring Valley Antique Mall was gone. I go to florists probably less than once a decade, and never went to this one, so there's not much I can say. I do find the name a bit curious, as it sounds more like a nursery than a flower shop.

We were having one of our many gray December rainy days while I was trying to get pictures of Rosewood Florist so I couldn't really frame anything except out the passenger side window without getting my lens wet.

Commenter Frank reported this store closed in early December, and it does seem to be up in the air at the moment. Their Facebook page reports, in a comment, that they are moving, but there are no details as yet.

(Hat tip to commenter Frank)

Driving down Millwood the other day, I noticed that longtime fixture Branham's appeared to be closed. Closer inspection reveals that while the building is indeed up for sale, Branham's has consolidated operations with the next door DeLoache.

I'm not sure when Flowers By Rita (also know as Flowers By Rita K) closed. It is listed in the February 1997 phonebook but not the February 2007 one, so my best guess would be the early 2000s.

I am curious as to what happened to the building (which is on the north side of Farrow just east of Fontaine). Google Streetview shows the building before whatever it was, so it must have been in the last few years. Fire is the most obvious guess, but there doesn't really seem to be any charred area around the damage..

Rish Florist (aka Rish Flower Shop) is on that little strip of State Street in West Columbia that also houses Terra and The New Bookland Tavern. They appear to have expanded out of their original space over the years to take what looks like three different storefronts. I really like the Depression-era glass blocks in parts of the building.

The closing sign says that they had been there for 57 years -- that is certainly a record that anyone could be proud of.

(Hat tip to commenter JB)

UPDATE 20 September 2012 -- Well, somebody apparently has a plan for this building. The interior has been gutted, and there is some sort of zoning hearing scheduled:

Here's a non-descript little warehouse on Gervais Street between Millwood and Harden that I couldn't ever recall seeing before when I noticed the big for-sale sign out front.

Apparently it was a flower staging area for local florists. The 2009-2010 county property assessments list the owner as "METRO COLUMBIA FLORIST / DELIVERY COOPERATIVE INC" while the "Delivery Pool" language comes from this listing of local florists. LoopNet says the building dates from 1970 while the county link says 1987. To me it looks a bit more 70s-ish than 80s-ish.

It's rather interesting how every-other letter has fallen off of the start of "FLORIST", rendering is as "F O I". I take the "L" as having been part of "POOL" though the spacing looks pretty tight for that.

UPDATE 8 March 2011 -- Hmm. It's been painted, the old logo letters have been taken down, the for-sale sign is off in the corner and the door is open:

UPDATE 13 April 2011 -- It's to be "Detail & Body Works By Frank". Picture a little blurry..

UPDATE 23 December 2011 -- Now open:

There's been a good bit of churn in the venerable Boozer Shopping Center lately: Golden China closed and became an Indian restaurant, the Book Dispensary moved, the allergy store moved, and the idiosyncratically apostrophed Gift's of Love florist has moved as well, or at least I hope it has. The sign says so, but the web site seems to point to something generic, and the new location is described in a rather non-specific way.

On the plus side for Boozer, Manifest is hanging in there after some initial plans to close, and a Dollar General has recently moved into the old Heroes & Dragons / Key Catalog Wholesalers slot.

I had noticed several times that this very interesting building on Millwood was vacant, but somehow never got around to taking any pictures until recently. This is the former location for Shandon Florist, an 80 year old area stalwart which has since moved to 2733 Millwood Avenue.

This real estate listing (which also has an aerial photo) says the building was built in 1962, and in a few of these shots it appears to me that there might be some roof issues which might have factored into the move. Still, I quite like the building. It seems to draw on the same period inspirations that went into the old Eggroll Station and Silver City buildings.

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I think I've been in florists to send condolence flowers more often than for any other reason which is not a pleasant association. I've never done that in Columbia as far as I can remember though, and so was never in Kirby Croft According to the archived version of the their website, the company started in 1947. That's a 63 year run, which is something the family can be proud of.

The sign on the front door leaves some hope for the future, but apparently not in this location as the building is up for sale. It's a very ineresting building too, with the bay window and the house-like main section. It's almost exactly across the street from former KFC and not too far from the old Varsity, Kershaw Tires and the old Eckerd's. I'm afraid this section of Main has seen better times.

(Hat tip to commenter Jim)