{"id":2362189,"date":"2026-04-07T09:54:38","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T09:54:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2362189"},"modified":"2026-04-07T09:54:38","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T09:54:38","slug":"funky-monkey-moves-to-new-magazine-street-location-entertainment-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/funky-monkey-moves-to-new-magazine-street-location-entertainment-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Funky Monkey moves to new Magazine Street location | Entertainment\/Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Funky Monkey owner Jen Mayfield spent years in a quiet battle with the wall that divided her Magazine Street clothing store in two.<\/p>\n

She watched men run for the hills when they opened the front door to find pink wigs and sequined dresses, never realizing a men\u2019s section overflowing with T-shirts and ball caps sat just on the other side of the divided sales floor. Customers of all creeds often turned to leave at the sight of shoppers crowded inside the Uptown store on busy afternoons, the wall taking up precious square footage even in the times of greatest need.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey felt like they couldn\u2019t squeeze in,\u201d Mayfield, 45, said, \u201cor didn\u2019t feel comfortable in small spaces.\u201d<\/p>\n

Space wasn\u2019t an issue in the early days, according to Mayfield. Once upon a time, Funky Monkey was so small and new that it occupied a single side of the building at 3125 Magazine.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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But in its nearly 30 years on the popular pedestrian promenade, the hybrid costume, vintage and modern clothing shop has become a New Orleans institution, one of the few stores to open and sell costumes for the first Mardi Gras after Hurricane Katrina and a place where everybody from teenagers to 80-year-olds come to find something special.<\/p>\n

The surrounding neighborhood has changed too, with Magazine Street\u2019s increasingly national commercialization<\/a> attracting more and more foot traffic and raising the stakes for mom and pop shops.<\/p>\n

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Jen Mayfield poses for a portrait at the new location of Funky Monkey on Magazine Street in New Orleans, Wednesday, March 25, 2026. (Staff photo by Enan Chediak, The Times-Picayune)<\/p>\n

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\n STAFF PHOTO BY ENAN CHEDIAK<\/span>
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The dividing wall at Funky Monkey, meanwhile, became a barrier that often made the 4,000-square-foot space feel half its size and twice as packed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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So in March, after three decades in the same yellow and burgundy building, Funky Monkey moved to a new location across the street at 3102 Magazine. It\u2019s on the same street, on the same block, and, surprisingly, has the same amount of square footage. There are high ceilings and big front windows that send natural light beaming into the store.<\/p>\n

And, more importantly, there\u2019s no divider wall in sight.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do think this space will just give us better flow,\u201d Mayfield said, going on to joke that, \u201cwe\u2019ll be able to get the guys in a little bit easier.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, customers can more freely move between the racks of men\u2019s and women\u2019s clothing, which cohabitate in the new space, and there\u2019s more room behind the cash register, too.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Mayfield said she hopes the new location will be easier for both her employees and customers to navigate.<\/p>\n

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Clothing racks are set up at the new location of Funky Monkey on Magazine Street in New Orleans, Wednesday, March 25, 2026. (Staff photo by Enan Chediak, The Times-Picayune)<\/p>\n

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\n STAFF PHOTO BY ENAN CHEDIAK<\/span>
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The fitting rooms \u2014 set back behind a series of curtains and doors in the old store \u2014 are visible from all corners of the new location, making it easier for employees to filter customers in and out. There\u2019s more peripheral space for lines at the cash register, a point of contention at the old location, where Mayfield said customers were forced to block clothing racks while waiting to check out.<\/p>\n

There were more serious structural issues with the building, too, which made it out of Katrina largely unscathed but wasn\u2019t so lucky when Hurricane Ida hit in 2021.<\/p>\n

Mayfield started working at Funky Monkey when she returned to New Orleans to rebuild after Katrina and later took over the business with her husband, 51-year-old Michael Mayfield. The building has been through a lot over the years, but Ida was the worst.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The roof caved in, and though it was promptly patched, Mayfield said it still has not been fully repaired. Insurance company inspections became more common after Ida, and Mayfield said the aging building and deferred maintenance made it a challenge to get contents insurance, a must-have for businesses operating in the evolving Magazine Street landscape.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it did change,\u201d Mayfield said. \u201cWe found ourselves in this new situation with the growth of Magazine Street. And so we sort of have to adapt to this new commercialization.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The building that held clothing store Funky Monkey was up for sale as of March 25, 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\n By KASEY BUBNASH | Staff writer<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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A series of building collapses in late 2024<\/a> got her thinking more seriously about a move. When the store across the street \u2014 once home to Frock Candy boutique and, most recently, an escape room \u2014 opened up, she jumped at the chance to start a new chapter.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Mayfield was sad to leave the building where Funky Monkey found so much success. She said she would have loved to buy the place, which is now up for sale, if she didn\u2019t think it would be a long-term disruption to business.<\/p>\n

Funky Monkey is fully operational in its new location now, but Mayfield said she\u2019s taking her time with the d\u00e9cor and setup. Designing the store\u2019s atmosphere is an opportunity she hasn\u2019t had in a long time, and she doesn\u2019t want to rush the process.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, she said, she’ll let the clothes speak for themselves.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.nola.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Funky Monkey owner Jen Mayfield spent years in a quiet battle with the wall that divided her Magazine Street clothing store in two. She watched men run for the hills when they opened the front door to find pink wigs and sequined dresses, never realizing a men\u2019s section overflowing with T-shirts and ball caps sat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2362190,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[128321],"class_list":["post-2362189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-hardwall"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Funky-Monkey-moves-to-new-Magazine-Street-location-EntertainmentLife.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2362189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2362189"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2362189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2362191,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2362189\/revisions\/2362191"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2362190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2362189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2362189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2362189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}