Car Show Benefit Is Evidence of Her Drive
The Front End Eights & Aces Kustom Kar Show, taking place Sunday from noon to 6 p.m. in Newport Beach, has evolved in three years into a community-based charity event. It draws an impressive lineup of local bands, more than 200 restored midcentury cars and some 1,500 attendees. Proceeds this year will benefit Kids 2000, an organization that helps abandoned children.
It’s a test of store owner Natalie Tass’ energy and determination that she’s continued the event after its premiere. Hours after the first one ended, Tass, who had just recovered from brain surgery, received a phone call informing her that her Newport Beach vintage apparel and furnishings store, the Front End, had burned down.
Some $150,000 worth of merchandise was destroyed. Left was a spray-painted note punctuated with profanity scrawled over the store’s side wall mural. Not enough evidence was ever secured to prosecute the arsonist.
Underinsured but undaunted, Tass hung up a banner declaring “No End to the Front End.”
Her parents helped her rebuild. Tass extended her store into the second floor, doubling the space to 1,400 square feet, and filling it with a wacky mix, from new shoes from the 1940s to dishes from the mid-1950s. She expanded the selection of retro-inspired new fashions by Southland brands such as Steady, No Dice and Von Dutch, as well as basics.
Reverend Horton Heat, Social Distortion and other band members are customers and she sells their albums, along with dozens of others by independent rockabilly, roots rock, swing and punk bands.
Tass is collaborating with Laguna Beach artisan Connie Archibald to create a line of weighty sterling silver jewelry festooned with crowns, angels, Chinese lettering or fleur-de-lis.
Right now, though, Tass has only Sunday on her mind. There are the bands to coordinate--Jive Kings, Tex Twil, Creepy Nice Guy, Rumble Kings, Orangemen and Hellbound Hayride--twice as many as in previous years. And an avalanche of more than 100 donated prizes for a raffle.