We hope to see you this Friday for our Grand Reopening celebration from 5 to 9pm. Our new home is located in the Alley Shops at the beautiful Bauer Building located at 115 W. 18th Street. The shop is tucked away on the back side of the building, up a cute little staircase. It’s easily accessible from both W. 18th street and W. 19th so feel free to park on either side. The Bauer was our first home and we are so honored to return. The shop looks perfect and we can’t wait to share it with you all. If you’ve been to our old space then the street will be very familiar to you. Just travel to W. 18th street like you always did, find the Bauer Building on the other side of the street and then follow the yellow stones painted on the sidewalk. We are also easily accessible to Papa Keno’s pizza patio, so there are really good free smells. Also, we’re even closer to Mildred’s than before which was an unexpected perk. See you at the party!
{ Witch Club }
We are super proud to introduce our newest subscription offering, Witch Club! This membership is perfect for people with a personal spiritual practice and/or who regularly use sage, palo santo, candles, resins, incense, crystals or other symbolic trinkets. For $25 a month we will send out hand selected items specific to the season and lunar cycle for you to integrate and use as support in your own craft. Witch Club rules, y'all! To read more about it or to sign up online, visit us here!
For those of you who are new to our site and shop, you may be interested to know that we offer two other kinds of subscription memberships as well!
Curio Of The Month - This membership is $25 a month and is wonderful for new collectors of natural science specimens. We offer a wide variety of items in this subscription, perfect for someone who is looking to expand their cabinet of curiosities! For more information on this offering, you can check it out here!
Arcana's Bug Club - Kansas City's only bug club is also $25 a month! Arcana's Bug Club subscription is excellent for budding entomologist, we send one or more specimens for you to spread, preserve and frame yourself! You can read more about it here - and If you don't know how to spread and frame insects and butterflies, we offer classes and workshops teaching you exactly how to preserve and display your beautiful specimens! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to hear all about our upcoming class schedules, or if you prefer you can always check our events calendar on this site, here!
{Holiday Gift Guide }
Holidays are coming up soon, ready or not! For those of you with a wonderful weirdo in your life, you may be flummoxed over what kind of exquisite curiosity to give as a gift this season - and we are here to help! Oracle has put together a handy-dandy gift guide to help you find the perfect treasure for your loved ones!
{ Open Sundays! }
Hi Y'all - just a quick announcement about our end of summer business hours, we have expanded them! Friday and Saturday we are open from 11:00 am - 7:00 pm. and Sundays from 11:00am - 3:00pm - come say hi and check out our excellent selection of natural science specimens, taxidermy, framed insects and butterflies, skeleton articulations, skulls, bones, crystals, sage (and witchy shit)!!
Felicien Rops
{ THREE YEARS! }
Holy smokes Y'all.
This week marks our third year of being open for business - it's super hard for me to believe, three years sounds like a long time to me, but it has flown by. And I'm learning more and more each day - which maybe seems like DURR, OF COURSE - but truly, each day brings a new lesson and educational opportunity. You think you know what's up, and then Alessandra and Christina are in the back with a pile of python bones, or a wallaby, or a freaking cavy (a member of the rodent family and animal which previously I had never heard of before in my life) skeleton like it's no big deal.
A word on Alessandra, AKA The Bone Wizard, since I mentioned her. We thought she was incredible when we first laid eyes on her in 2013 and boy oh boy are we lucky she liked us back! Alessandra Dzuba, you may know, is not only the brains and dexterous hands behind many of our beautiful natural science specimens, but she is also a phenomenal fine artist (who somehow manages to exhibit her work regularly, probably because she is a wizard and can manipulate the Space Time Continuum). Check out her works here, and prepare to have your mind blown!
This is also a fine time to mention Carrie, who continues to grow and evolve at a suspiciously inhuman rate (my money is on Aliens). When we began this adventure, Carrie was juggling a full-time gig as a therapist and raising two young children while also keeping natural science specimens in stock and the lights on at Oracle. Somehow during all this she has also managed to learn and integrate numerology and astrology into her counseling practice - a shining example of developing and following her intuition in a holistic way. If you know Carrie, you already know that she is a badass, but you may not know that she does THIS.
We have been so fortunate to have so many incredible people intern and apprentice with us at Oracle. We appreciate your intellect, your creativity, your talent and your unflinching ability to get your hands dirty with animal remains. We are so grateful and happy that you found us!
A bunch of weirdos like us could only have thrived in this kind of environment, so we are pretty dang lucky. Cheers for three years!!
Thank you to our interns/apprentice - We have been so fortunate to have so many incredible people
{ Meet Ash MIyagawa }
I don't know what we did to deserve having such awesome people in our shop, but we struck pure gold with Ash Miyagawa - an artist, illustrator and science-enthusiast! Her work is badass and we want her to move in and stay with us forever. (We aren't creepy).
Ash Miyagawa, ink 2014-2015
ORACLE - What is your background? (this can be anything you wish to share; hometown, education, age, work experience before Oracle, etc)
ASH MIYAGAWA - I'm a 22 year old from Chicago, IL. I'm currently in my last semester at the Kansas City Art Institute, and I'm probably the only barista in the world who is not a morning person (which is what I do to pay for cat food when I'm not at Oracle).
O - What is your area of study/focus?
AM - Illustration and Printmaking, with a focus in scientific illustration.
O - What are your interests?
AM - The entirety of the natural world (but especially botany), nonfiction books & essays, eating A+ peaches (they're so rare) and finding very high places.
Ash Miyagawa, Ink + Digital, 2015
O - What is your favorite thing to do at Oracle?
AM - I really like getting to help with projects like the jawbone talismans or the wet specimens, but I really love deep cleaning the place. It gives me a quiet time to reflect on things and fall in love with all the organic shapes all over again. I always feel better when I finish.
O - Very important, serious and professional question, what is your favorite snack?
AM - (Very specifically) That dehydrated "just mango- no sulfates!" dried mango from Trader Joes. I could live on just that.
O - What is your best, post-apocalyptic/pioneer-type skill?
AM - Based on past experience, I've found that I'm part cockroach when it comes to dealing with difficult times, so that. My cockroach-like tendencies.
Ash Miyagawa, Ink 2014
You can check out more of Ash Miyagawa's excellent work here - or better yet, go have a wonderful snack/breakfast/lunch/coffee/tea at Mildred's Coffeehouse and see her work in person!!