Golden girl

Dick Diamond’s Golden Jackal is a new clothing store opening in midtown Reno at 600 S. Virginia St. Dick Diamond is a fictional mascot partially inspired by Dick Damond’s Motors, a car lot that was once in the same location. The store sports a mix of classic vintage clothes and new clothes that can be custom tailored, including embroidery by Cody McElroy of Dirty Needle Embroidery, and leather stamping by Jake Houston, who’s known around Northern Nevada as a country music performer. Taylor Newell is a co-owner of the store, along with Zachary Girdis of nearby Midtown Community Yoga and Peter Barnato of The Loving Cup bar. Golden Jackal’s grand opening is Jan. 19 from 6 to 9 p.m.

What’s the basic concept?

It’s highly curated vintage and new clothing. The new clothing comes from designers that [Barnato] and I have both met in, like, Portland and L.A. We get jewelry from them and clothing. We have Filthy Animal Apparel, which is a local from here in Reno, Laura Cooper. We’re carrying her stuff here too. The vibe is very ’70s, ’60s, with a touch of ’80s band tees and stuff—rock ’n’ roll. … My thing is that I like each decade, when it comes to fashion, and I play with it into one look. Sometimes I’ll wear bellbottoms—so, ’70s—with a satin bomber—’80s. … The two other people working here [Houston and McElroy]—we give them free rent, and they’ll just make stuff, which I think is a cool aspect of the store. There will be people in here constantly making things. That will be happening live. They’re part of the store. I think they’re a bigger part of the store than we are.

So, you’ll have people in here making things while the store is open?

Yeah, and we’ve tossed a lot of ideas around. I have a friend who does oils, so she’ll sell some of her essential oils, but on—I don’t know what day it’s going to be—but one Saturday she’ll come and speak about it after hours. And we’ll have people come in and learn about these oils. We want to do that with a bunch of things. Like, one week, how to distress your denim because that’s super in. So you bring your jeans in, and we’ll go through and learn how to do it.

And some other local businesses are contributing some things?

Natural Selection is going to put some taxidermy up for us. [Will Durham’s] Nevada Neon Project hooked us up with this neon sign, which is awesome.

The grand opening is Thursday?

Jake Houston is playing an acoustic set. I’ll have some friends, some hot model babes, walking around, just being flirty and fun with everyone. We’ll have a photo booth and a cool furniture setup. … The Nest is doing our furniture setup. It’s a monthly thing that we’ll change out, but we basically want it to look like you’re in someone’s living room. It’s a good opportunity for people to take pictures, and everything on the stage is for sale, while we’re promoting other Reno businesses. … You’d think The Nest would be our direct competition, but we’re all helping each other out. We needed a furniture display, she hooked us up, and we’re leaving her price tags up and telling everyone to go there.

What do you like about this location?

All of the windows. My favorite part of this store is that Motor Lodge sign out there. How big it is. We got the Wild Orchid right across the street.