Just beyond the coastal fog at Valley Hills Center off Carmel Valley Road stands a board and batten building painted red as farmsteads of old. This simple building is inhabited by Tancredi & Morgen, a charming shop with a treasure trove of carefully curated wares that showcase the owners’ love of design with items ranging from hand-made textiles to books on design to antique furnishings sourced from the U.S., Europe and beyond.
Tancredi & Morgen has occupied this delightful spot for almost 40 years. Run by husband and wife Roger and Marsha Alldis and twin daughters Gwynneth and Megan—who were just a year old when the family purchased the shop. The story of this family business begins with Marsha Alldis, who grew up in a traditional home in California’s Ojai Valley with a mother who sewed the family’s clothes and made everything from scratch. Marsha herself learned sewing and handwork and eventually embarked on a career in fashion. Working as a shoe buyer for Giorgio of Beverly Hills, she learned merchandising and design. In the mid-1970s, Marsha moved to Carmel and opened a shop of her own called Old World Cloth (on Lincoln and Seventh next to La Rambla) where she sold bolts of rare fabrics from Liberty of London as well as European silks and showcased her clothing and accessory designs.
Roger’s journey to Carmel was a much longer one. Hailing from a family of engineers in South Africa, Roger came to the area to see Big Sur in 1985 while on a voyage of self discovery. Visiting Carmel on his sojourn, he happened to meet Marsha in a crosswalk on Mission Street. They recognized each other from an event they’d both attended and stopped to say hello. Smitten, they visited Big Sur together that very day, dipping their toes in the river as they lounged in Adirondack chairs at the River Inn. Soon after they were married and welcomed their twin daughters the following year.
Meanwhile, just east of town at Valley Hills Center, Tancredi & Morgen was a fledgling shop, owned by Sharon Tancredi and Jacqueline Morgen. The two women ran the store for a couple of years, but found it was time to sell when Tancredi decided to leave the area. Marsha knew Tancredi and she loved the store. She thought it would be a perfect opportunity to expand her existing business and Roger agreed. They purchased the business in 1987 and began running it together. Marsha designed clothing made of fabrics sourced from Europe, working with a talented seamstress to bring her designs to life (a working relationship that began with Old World Cloth and has lasted for over 50 years). Roger, with his discerning eye for craftsmanship and utility, sourced the antiques.
Twins Gwynneth and Megan were raised in the business, spending much of their childhood in the store and on buying trips through Italy, the South of France and the U.K., heading to flea markets in the wee hours of the mornings and to museums in the afternoons. That exposure had a profound impact on both daughters, influencing the direction of their educations, their design sensibilities and ultimately their art. Both women pursued degrees in the arts and international studies and both have found careers in the arts while continuing to contribute to the family business. Megan, the older twin (by four minutes), is a documentary filmmaker and photographer who spent six years working at the legendary Chez Panisse in Berkeley. Her documentary work has taken her to locales as distant as Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and to the bustling streets of Mexico City. She recently received a grant from the Redford Center to help complete her documentary film about preserving ancient Aztec farming practices in Mexico. Meanwhile Gwynneth’s path took her to Florence where she studied fine art at both the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze and at Studio Arts College International, where she earned an MFA. While abroad, she also learned to DJ at an Italian disco in her free time. Trained in figurative oil painting, she moves between painting from life and creating layered multimedia-based abstract works. When not at Tancredi & Morgen or in her studio, Gwynneth can be found DJing various public and private events, including dance nights for the Monterey Symphony.
Throughout its four decades, Tancredi & Morgen has continued to evolve, sourcing products from different locations based on changing consumer trends, offering a delightfully fresh and relevant collection of goods with an inventory that represents the family’s favorite things—from pottery and glassware to artisan pillows and textiles to vintage hotel flatware. Products are chosen with distinct intention, sourced ethically from artisans, craftsmen and dealers the family knows well and feels strongly about supporting—both locally and around the globe—supplying their shop with exclusive items not found elsewhere in the region. At the heart of the Tancredi & Morgen aesthetic is the family’s love of things old and new, offering items of quality with purpose and beauty.
While in recent years, many retail businesses have turned to online sales, the Alldis family has chosen to continue their focus on the brick-and-mortar, maintaining that face-to-face interaction—and the community it creates—is key to their success. So it’s no surprise that the Alldises are a family of consummate entertainers. Tancredi & Morgen regularly hosts community events in the store that flow over into the lovely grassy knoll adjacent the building with signature cocktails and epicurean delights. Events feature skilled crafts people, artists and artisans—both local and visiting—for workshops and trunk shows of unique items. This year alone, Tancredi & Morgen has hosted a plethora of gatherings—including a pop up for Sabah shoes that tied in Tira Nanza Wines and Mirth Kitchen; a chef’s social with Chef Adam Silverstein; a spring gathering with Lady & Larder, Studio Vanessa Cowdrey Ceramics and Current & Cooper Jewelry; and textile workshops with local artist Jessica Bovert and Valley Botanicals—all dynamic and engaging offerings designed to foster community, bringing local purveyors together and giving them a venue to shine.
As the holidays approach, the Tancredi & Morgen team is preparing a specially curated holiday gift to be made available through their website, but they encourage an in-person visit to the store to find an abundance of winter gift-giving inspiration. To that end, they invite you to attend a festive holiday sip and shop on December 14 from 4:00 to 7:00. The event will feature jewelry artist Current & Copper with Carmel Valley’s Lady & Larder providing beverages and light bites. Through events of this kind and through their personal warmth and their unique individual interests, the Alldis family has a knack for bringing together the things and people they love, extending the reach of Tancredi & Morgen well beyond the confines of their beautiful store’s board and batten walls.
Tancredi & Morgen is located at 7174 Carmel Valley Road. For more information, call 831/625-4477 or visit www.tancrediandmorgen.com.