Sifting through samurai spoils
Local man opens shop fit only for a true shogun
By Brian Freedman
February 04, 2005
Paul MacLardy slowly opened the wooden doors to the dusty nineteenth-
century Japanese cabinet and removed his weapon, cautiously
unwrapping the sheet protecting the 36-inch samurai sword. With
pride and reverence, he gripped the sharkskin handle and held up the
weapon capable of beheading a man in a swift motion.
MacLardy is the owner of Arise, an Asian antiques store that
recently moved to College Park. The store houses thousands of relics
from a culture MacLardy has grown to love.
The cluttered warehouse hidden by an innocent-looking, building
has everything from $5 silk candleholders to $6,000 seventeenth-
century Buddha statues, from a $20 small, ribbetting wood frog to
the sword, which is worth $10,000.
Arise, which MacLardy has run for more than 20 years, mainly sells
wholesale to museums, catalogues and antique shops, but also boasts
an impressive list of celebrity customers.
Hilary Duff, after noticing Madonna wear a kimono to the Grammys,
fell in the love with the Material Girl's dress and ordered her
people to contact Arise, said MacLardy. Duff then purchased a
decorative blue-and-white kimono from Arise, which she donned for
the Nickelodeon's Kid's Choice Awards in 2002.
Arise has also supplied furniture for sets of motion pictures and
local plays. The Harrison Ford movie Random Hearts exhibited a few
furniture pieces from his warehouse, and MacLardy provided most of
the kimonos for the Arena Stage's production of M. Butterfly.
All the kimonos are designed by MacLardy and produced by his
business partner in India.
He purchases the other rare and avant-garde merchandise through
connections in Japan, China and Indonesia, and has it shipped back
to his warehouse in 20- to 40-foot-long containers.
"I like the fact that we provide a lot of jobs overseas. That's
important to us," said MacLardy, who has a background in public
interest work. "It's creative. We do a lot of different things, so
it doesn't get boring, and that's my personality. If I had wanted to
get rich, I would have just done one thing."
MacLardy first dabbled in the Asian antique business as part of a
fund-raising kimono sale for a food co-op he owned. His interest in
Asian culture began with books and television shows.
"I got into it from the James Clavell novel Shogun. I couldn't
believe seeing the samurai and stuff," said MacLardy. "When I was in
college I would go to the Metropolitan Museum and I would see the
Chinese and Japanese art and I kind of fell in love with it."
Now not only does he speak fluent Japanese, but he also co-wrote a
book about kimonos three years ago that sold 9,000 copies nationwide.
MacLardy plans to reopen his store, which was previously in Takoma
Park, by hosting a university-only pre-sale on Feb. 21, and sell
items at wholesale prices with a 50 percent discount.
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