Family of SLO County hotel chain owner buys 35-year-old gift shop. What’s next?
The family behind local lodging chain Moonstone Hotel Properties has purchased another building with a long history in downtown Cambria.
The sale marks the end of a 35-year history for Oliver’s Twist, a gift shop that sold everything from housewares and small furnishings to artwork, wine and chocolates. The store’s owners, Emil Stipanovich and Frank Tafelski, have retired.
Dirk Winter, who heads Moonstone Hotel Properties, confirmed in an email that his son and daughter had purchased the Burton Drive property, which was once Cambria’s fire house.
“Yes, Bram and Tawny did close today on this building,” Winters wrote May 11.
In addition to hotels in Monterey and Oregon, Moonstone Hotel Properties owns Cambria Pines Lodge, J. Patrick House and Inn and Sea Otter Inn in Cambria, as well as the former Brambles restaurant next door to Oliver’s Twist.
Bram Winter, director of operations for Moonstone Hotel Properties, said Tuesday there are plans for some “limited refurbishment, but no big building changes” at the Oliver’s Twist site. The company will probably establish a gift shop there for now, he said.
Winters wrote that his children “will certainly look at synergies with the former Brambles property.”
The Brambles closed in 2008, about a year after the death of Nick Kaperonis, who’d operated the Burton Drive restaurant since 1982. Some partners in Ansun Enterprises, the corporation that formerly owned the 48,000-square-foot property, operated an eatery in the building from 2009 to 2011.
Winter bought the former Brambles restaurant property soon afterward. The 8,000-square-foot building has been essentially vacant ever since, although some work has been done inside the circa-1870 building that became the Brambles by the Bridge in the 1950s.
The Winter family has had several different development plans for the building at the Santa Rosa Creek bridge, but has said those plans likely wouldn’t include a restaurant.
Bram Winter said Tuesday that the retail portion of the Brambles property project has been approved by San Luis Obispo County, but that they’re still “sorting through on the hotel project” that’s a component of the long-term plan.
He said he hoped to have more answers, plus a new name for the former Oliver’s Twist shop, within a few weeks.
History of Cambria gift shop Oliver’s Twist
The Cambria Fire Department was housed at 4039 Burton Drive for decades. Then, in 1998, Stipanovich and Tafelski bought and substantially remodeled the building — turning it into the home of Oliver’s Twist.
Oliver’s Twist was a retail fixture on Burton Drive for two dozen years. For 11 years before that, it was located at 724 Main St., where the Melanie Sylvester Gallery is now.
Stipanovich said May 12 that “we’re not used to (retirement) yet. We’ve got a lot more closing up to do, so it’s not over yet, even though escrow closed yesterday.”
He and Tafelski live on the far eastern edge of Paso Robles, almost to Creston, Stipanovich said, and “we still have the vineyard. We’re going to take our time and decide what, if anything we’re going to do differently.”
Meanwhile, townspeople said they’re curious what will happen to the building that sits between the former Brambles and The Squibb House Bed and Breakfast.
Lorienne Schwenk said May 13 that she’d been glad to hear that “the property had been bought,” rather than it being a case of a business closing down.
“We hope it’s not empty for too long,” Schwenk said. “Burton Drive certainly does not need that, especially as summer starts.”
While she’s “disappointed to see such a stalwart, longstanding store go,” she said, “we certainly wish Emil and Frank well.”
Longtime Cambria artist Pat Riley, who keeps close tabs on North Coast businesses, posted on social media on May 11 that she was “wishing all the best to Emil and Frank,” and hoped that they’ll “be able to rest and enjoy the time that all those years of hard work brought them to.”
She said Oliver’s Twist had been “a beautiful shop, unique unto itself.”
This story was originally published May 23, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misspelled the last name of Oliver’s Twist co-owner Frank Tafelski.
