Robert Mosher stands inside Red Bank Drapery Shop, which is closing after 69 years in business. (Photo by Brian Donohue. Click to enlarge)
By Brian Donohue
On a frigid day in downtown Red Bank, Robert Mosher stood inside Red Bank Drapery Shop, the store mostly empty except for a few ancient sewing machines and rolls of fabric lined up against the wall. After 69 years in Red Bank, the family-run business is closing down.
“It’s the end of the road here,” Mosher said. “We had a good run. I’m proud of what we did.”
A few minutes later, just around the corner on West Front Street, two best friends warmly welcomed a visitor into their bright new ‘sip and Design’ business, J & J Art Studio. They had been open two days. The space was bright, the mood was ebullient.
And so it goes, the cyle of comings and goings, the hellos and goodbyes of Red Bank’s Retail Churn.
Keep reading for more on those moves, news of several more, and a no BS assessment 2025’s of Red Bank’s retail scene, 2026’s first installment of redbankgreen‘s Retail Churn.
Jenelle Tenes and Joanie Quackenbush inside J & J Art Studio at 23-25 West Front Street. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
Before we get to the updates, let’s Churn back the clock for a look at 2025.
In December, Red Bank RiverCenter touted in a press release the eye-popping tally of 22 businesses that had opened during 2025 in the downtown special improvement district. For a town of Red Bank’s size, that sounds amazing.
But what the press release (and the parroting by other local media) glaringly omitted was the number of businesses that had closed.
I mean, that’s kind of like a scoreboard at a football game that only shows the points scored by one team.
So we pored through our Retail Churn posts and found at least nine businesses that closed or went out of business in 2025.
We don’t catch everything, so that’s a rough count to be sure. But it does looks like Openings beat Closings and easily covered the point spread. That’s pretty good news by any measure, especially in a year when many businesses in the downtown were pushing back against Broadwalk, the seasonal closure of northern Broad Street, arguing that it was killing their businesses.
The trend was most visible in the Broadwalk area itself, where a row of long vacant storefronts were filled with the likes of Street Kitchen Pub, The Liquor World, and the handmade jeweler King Baby. And yet, a stroll through downtown this week found two new storefronts going dark and at least two other longtime vacancies still waiting for business to make them home.
As Heraclitus might have said about downtown ancient Athens, Churn is the only constant. So here’s your regular rundown of the comings and goings.
An ad for Red Bank Drapery Shop in the Red Bank Register newspaper in 1957.
Robert Mosher’s father opened Red Bank Drapery Shop in 1957 on Monmouth Street. The business bounced between a few downtown locations before moving to 49 Broad Street about estimated 25 years ago.
Mosher’s seen a lot: He recalls the era when he and his father couldn’t get through lunch without customers coming in, the downtown bustling with foot traffic. And the Dead Bank days after the malls clobbered downtowns and Broad Street was lined with empty storefronts.
These days, he says, “If you don’t have a heavy presence online, you just get swallowed up.”
When his mother died recently, Mosher, 63, re-assessed things and decided semi-retirement, with some fabric sales conducted from home via the internet, was the way to go.
Asked how he feels about it all, he said, “I’m sad.” But he added a few moments later. “I have no regrets.”
Mosher reckons there are only two other businesses in town that have been open longer: Mustillo’s, the dress shop at 11 Broad Street, and Good Housekeeping at 46 Monmouth Street.
Asked by a reporter who walked in off the street when exacty he’s closing up for good, he replied, “I actually thought I had locked the door.”
Robert Mosher: outta here, with no regrets. (Photo by Brian Donohue)
After we left the drapery shop, we headed to 23 West Front Street, where Jenelle Tenes and Joanie Quackenbush seemed just as surprised to see us walking into J & J Art Studio on its second day in business. But the vibe shift was real.
The place was bright and spiffy, the duo raring to go.
They met while both were in college and working at Applebee’s. Since 2022, they have been running J&J SipNPaint, which they bill as “New Jersey’s travelling Sip & Design experience.”
The business does adult and child birthday parties, showers, corporate teambuilding and other events in which participants create their own artwork with materials they supply. The ‘sip’ part can refer to wine, or juice and soda, depending on the crowd.
J&J decided the time was right for a brick and mortar location where they could host similar events or serve folks walking in off the street. 
The new place has an events room for parties and lessons, along with take home kits and “Grab & Go Art” for sale.
Their ribbon cutting Instgram post reads, “Open everyday for walk-in projects including sea glass art, pressed flower art, sea glass trees, resin boards, succulent ceramic planters and so much more! Just show up, BYOB and snacks!
Come by, say hi and make a craft with your girls J&J!”
The space became available when Pilates Plus next door realized they didn’t need the extra space in the adjacent storefron, they said.
In other Churn news:
SAFFRON, LIGHTS OFF
The inside of 31 West Front Street, where tables are still set, but the place has shut down.
Saffron Indian restaurant at 31 West Front Street seems to have shut down just around the second anniversary of its 2023 opening in the spot that had housed Front Street Trattoria for years.
In November, after the business was listed for sale on internet listings sites, Owner Manish Kumar told Churn he was still exploring a possible sale but had not decided whether to close the place if no buyer emerged.
The upscale Indian eatery had drawn rave reviews, but in a November interview with Churn, owner Manish Kumar said, “Business is soft.”
Kumar had just put the restaurant up for sale, but said at that time he wasn’t sure if he would revamp the business or shut it down if no buyer emerged.
ANOTHER CUP?
Good news if you’re looking for cup of coffee downtown and find yourself in such a caffeine-deprived stupor that you stumble past the other half dozen coffee shops places already up and running in the area. Because there’s another one coming.
Aura Coffee Roasters is setting up shop at 60 Broad Street in the spot formerly home to a Good Life Organic Kitchen franchise, according to a sign posted out front. (Good Life’s owners told Churn in December 2024 they were selling the biz and moving).
We can only assume Aura’s market research found the area is not quite at the saturation point. We’ve seen this before with frozen yogurt, then cupcakes. But we hope the rising flood of coffee lifts all boats and wish everyone well.
Yeah, we’re later than a low and slow barbacoa on this one, but in case you’ve been away in Cancun for weeks, Mexican eatery Mi Lupita’s Kitchen has found a new home at 193 Shrewsbury Avenue after being kicked out of their former location on Bridge Avenue.
The old location, with its inviting courtyard, is slated to be bulldozed to make way for 20 condominiums.
But owner Chris Marroquin found a space that was pretty much ready to go inside the Shrewsbury Avenue location.
The spot was briefly home to two other short-lived Mexican eateries over the past three years, Juanito’s Charcoal Grill, then Toro Rojo, then Juanito’s Charcoal Grill once again.
Even the colorful decor and artwork was already in place – they just changed the name on the cactus on the wall from Juanito’s to Lupita’s. Here’s some photos:
A new vintage/consignment clothing shop, Duet Upscale Retail, opened in December at 30 Monmouth Street, in the row of small shops next to the Dublin House.
They offer mens, womens and youth clothing, footwear, jewelry and accessories. They had cool flannel shirts we put on your Christmas list, but Santa didn’t come through.
