The store in Sacramento also had a unique design. In Richmond, the company built the Peeling Wall showroom that appeared to have a peeling facade (located on Midlothian Turnpike) as well as a Forest showroom that appeared to have trees growing out of it (located at 9008 Quioccasin Road). This building purportedly "appeared in more books on 20th-century architecture than photographs of any other modern structure". In the 1970s, Best Products contracted with James Wines' " Sculpture in the Environment" (SITE) architecture firm to design nine highly unorthodox retail facilities, notably a tongue-in-cheek structure called the "Indeterminate Facade" in Houston, Texas with a severely distressed facade. īest Café at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Virginia. Much of the Lewis Collection can be seen at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and a café named after the company opened in that museum. As a result, the company, as well as the Lewises, gathered a significant collection of 20th-century art. The company had a strong sense of promotion and artistic sensibilities it was legend in artistic circles that it would trade store merchandise for art. The first showroom was at 4909 West Marshall Street in Richmond, just across the street from the new Willow Lawn Shopping Center. In 1957, the Lewises sent out their first catalog. Lewis thought of selling additional merchandise along with the bills for encyclopedias. Sydney Lewis, a lawyer educated at Washington & Lee and Harvard Business School, worked with his father managing an encyclopedia sales operation in Richmond. The company was founded by Sydney Lewis and Frances Lewis. When in operation, Best Products was traded on the NASDAQ exchange as "BESTQ". At the time of their second bankruptcy filing in September 1996, the company operated 169 Best stores and 11 Best Jewelry stores in 23 states, as well as a nationwide mail-order service. The company was in existence for four decades before closing all of their stores by February 1997 and completely liquidating by December 1998. Home furnishings, consumer electronics, jewelry, housewares, toysĪshby's, Basco, Dolgin's, Great Western, Jafco, Labelle's, Miller Sales, Modern Merchandising, Rogersīest Products Company, Inc., or simply Best, was a chain of American catalog showroom retail stores founded by Sydney and Frances Lewis in 1957 and formerly headquartered in Richmond, Virginia. For the New York department store, see Best & Company. For the home electronics chain, see Best Buy.
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