KAPAA — Bryce and Andrew Gawdun aren’t necessarily happy that a pickup smashed into their shop, Curious…Kapaa, this summer, just 31 days after they opened.
But they spent the past four months making lemonade out of those lemons, and the second week in November, the home furnishings and gift store in downtown Kapaa opened its doors once again.
“I wouldn’t say that it was a good thing, but we got a second chance to make it better,” Bryce Gawdun said. “We did the whole place ourselves the first time, and we changed a few things.”
A double-decker table is now attached to the central desk-like counter, repurposed from some small tables that were smashed during the accident.
“A lot of what we have in here is re-purposed now, which is something that I like,” Bryce Gawdun said.
A white Dodge Dakota truck slammed into the side of the shop at about 60 miles per hour in early August, Gawdun said, and crashed through the wall adjoining an alley.
“It made it all the way to the other wall,” Andrew Gawdun said. “That was about 1 a.m. We got here at about 5 a.m. and it was still there.”
Andrew Gawdun said no arrests have been made and he doesn’t know who was driving the vehicle.
Requests for a status in the case from Kauai Police Department weren’t responded to by deadline.
The crash also gave Curious… a second chance at inventory, and the owners said they’ve done some fine-tuning, stocking shelves with one-of-a-kind items.
Having the shop open for one month and then closed four months before welcoming back customers turned out to be a great market study, the Gawduns said.
“We have more local things,” Andrew Gawdun said. “We’ve been meeting with a lot of local artisans.”
Curious…Kapaa is one of two stores the Gawduns own. The second is the flagship Curious…, located in Southern California.
Last Thursday, Andrew Gawdun left for five weeks to help with the holiday season on the Mainland — tight timing, they said, with the re-opening of the Kapaa store just one week prior.
“We do all sorts of things for the holidays,” Andrew Gawdun said. “Over here, we’re going to do ‘Karaoke for a Discount Day’ sometime in the 10 days before Christmas.”
They also have something special — and secret — planned for December’s First Saturday in Kapaa.
“We like to have lots of things that make it a fun place for locals,” Bryce Gawdun said. “We are so grateful to the community, too, for showing up for us. We just want to invite everyone to come check out our new digs.”
Alongside the stores ups and downs, the couple have been working on adopting a child, and they said they’re getting closer to accomplishing that dream as well.
“We had a couple that almost happened, but didn’t work out,” Andrew Gawdun said. “We’re getting closer and we’re really excited about that, too.”
