The Santa Monica showroom is open Monday to Wednesday by appointment noon to 4 p.m. (The second showroom, Merchant Modern East, is at 3127 Glendale Blvd. On a recent visit to the Santa Monica store, prices ranged from $120 for a wooden wine rack to $2,500 for a vintage leather safari chair. The stores are a homage to Portmans’ mother, an artist and ceramicist, and they are stocked with Midcentury Modern furniture, vintage Moroccan rugs, contemporary ceramics from Paris and Italy, and goods by local artists such as Heather Rosenman and All Roads Studio. “I like things that are a little unusual.” “I wanted it to look like a house,” says co-owner Denise Portmans, who runs the store, along with an Atwater Village location, with her artist daughter Sara Marlowe. Walking into Merchant in Santa Monica is like walking into an artist’s enclave packed with vintage furniture, antiques, contemporary ceramics and art.
