The new space puts a G-rated twist on Paxton Gate’s slightly morbid, neo-Victorian, taxidermalicious brand. Life-size trees with branches of spiraling nautical rope fill the cavernous, 1,500-square-foot space; vintage Structo fire trucks are placed on pedestals; Roald Dahl’s Revolting Recipes and Freaky Flora are shelved in the story corner; and puppets of all sorts hang on the walls, including an old French marionette that Quigley admits is “cute and scary at the same time."

While some may argue that Curiosities’ vaguely morose inventory may induce the occasional nightmare, we’d claim, based on the increasing popularity of Paxton Gate’s peculiar offerings over the last 16 years, that it’s actually the stuff of dreams.

Surely Quigley’s destiny as San Francisco’s prince of oddities was a foregone conclusion, just by virtue of his hopeful 1989 arrival here—to the bright lights, big city—from a sleepy Northern California ghost town called Happy Valley.

“My dad asked me five or six years ago, ‘You’re probably not moving back, are you?’” The elder Quigley had been concerned that the retail business wasn’t proving lucrative for his son, since, up until 2004, the Mission District resident had had to supplement his diminutive Paxton Gate salary by slinging drinks at Doctor Bombay’s, Casanova and Kilowatt. “He was sweet for asking, but I knew the day I got here that I was never leaving."