In visiting Half Moon Music, a hippie inspired store at the Virginia Beach oceanfront, Noah Baker, a manager, gave his insights and experiences there. Half Moon is a hippie-style and cool vibe store that has sold music, clothing, art pieces, hats, tie-dye apparel and much more since 1988. The store specializes in Grateful Dead and tour-style clothing and gear.
When walking in, you’re not sure where to look first. There is a large selection of antiques and items hanging from the ceiling. “It’s a lot of clothing for hippie ladies and an almost museum of fun little stuff,” Baker said. You don’t need to worry about finding parking as they have customer parking right at the store. This store is known for its down-to-earth atmosphere. “We try to make it laid back and incorporate the whole hippie mindset,” Baker said.
Half Moon is right by the beach, a few blocks from the boardwalk, so they usually attract tourists. Their hours are from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Hours are extended during the summer because of tourists. This store gets recognized by all the art murals painted on the side of the building by local VB artists. “People come in being like ‘oh I saw that, we drive by it all the time,’” Baker said. The interesting look of the store’s exterior attracts local and touring customers. “A lot of tourists come in here not knowing what we are,” Baker said.
Half Moon is filled with everything groovy and has a mural outside to match. See the shop’s interior (ABOVE) and exterior views (BELOW).
Abee Cassidy|Marlin Chronicle
The murals on the outside give this gift shop a nice touch of what you’re going to expect when walking in. They’re vibrant and a beautiful visual expression of vibrant colors, mushrooms, flowers and animals with themes of peace, love and psychedelics all over the place. Atmospheric decoration continues throughout the interior. The inside consists of saturated vibrant colors and is decorated from top to bottom. The store has windows you can look into while passing to give you the gist of the content inside.
Older hippies and teenagers are a part of the large demographic that shop at Half Moon. “Young teenage girls and sixty and up are most of our people,” Baker said.
The top sellers right now are pants and patches. “The biggest selling thing is womens’ harem flare pants and patches lately, surprisingly,” Baker said. Baker’s favorite item that they sell is a new product they had shipped in around March 21. “We just got a bunch of new tie-dyes of our store logo and I’m really happy with the way they turned out,” Baker said. These shirts are not only for employees, as customers can buy them too.
You can purchase items at Half Moon online but you’d be missing out on the breathtaking murals that are worth going to see everything. If you don’t make a purchase it’s still worth going. You don’t have to be a teenage girl or a sixty-year-old to make a purchase, either. Located on 305 16th St, Virginia Beach, VA 2345, it’s about a 20 minute drive from VWU.
By Abee Cassidy
arcassidy@vwu.edu
