It’s a museum, but everything is for sale.
That’s how Paul Scott Silvera, a fourth-generation Portuguese Point Loman, described Scout, his mercantile, gifts, interior design, color consulting and home staging company in Quarters D, 2675 Rosecrans St. at Dewey Road, in Liberty Station.
Scout provides nostalgic products for the home, including furniture, lighting and paint as well as vintage artifacts, with a one-acre garden leading up to it.
Silvera noted that Liberty Station is the perfect spot for his business, given that the former naval base is itself historic as well as being in Point Loma, one of San Diego’s oldest neighborhoods.
“If you live in a house that was built before World War II, you don’t really have the scale of furniture to match the floor plans,” he said. “We create living space in rooms that are authentic, that feel up to date and represent what our target audience likes, which is a mixture of things that are new and old.”
People come to Scout because “they want to fill their homes with things that have style and taste,” noted Silvera.
Silvera said the interior design aspect of his business is “all about achieving a look.” And that “look” is offered at Scout in Bungalow, Boulevard, Scotch & Soda and Society styles, showcased in different rooms in Quarters D, once the naval base commander’s living quarters.
An excursion through Scout is like a journey back in time. One room has old cameras from the ’20s to the ’40s that Silvera has collected during buying trips to Europe. He carries exotic items like soap made by nuns in France, a wide assortment of jewelry and a plethora of home décor items of nearly every style and period.
“We’ve got something for you, whether your budget is $18, or $1,800,” Silvera said.
Each year, Scout picks a designer from the past whose stylings get showcased in one of the business’ display rooms. Last year, interior designer James Thompson, an American businessman who helped revitalize the Thai silk industry in the 1950s and 1960s, was selected.
“We created this room using his fabrics,” said Silvera, noting that Thompson was rich and famous when he lived in Asia during that period.
“He disappeared in the ’60s,” said Silvera. “He went out to smoke a cigarette — and disappeared.”
Scout, with its 4,000-square-foot retail gallery, has been in Liberty Station for more than three years. Silvera founded his first home décor and mercantile store in 2002 in the San Francisco Bay area. Since then, Scout has grown to include interior design, color consulting and staging services.
“We’re all about the house: buying the house, selling the house, decorating the house,” Silvera said.
Of his staging business, Silvera said, “We get houses ready to sell, furnishing them from our store. That gives us a retail presence in neighborhoods where we don’t have a retail presence. We also have an affiliation with a brokerage that sells houses and has Scout stage them.”
Hours at Scout are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., 4 p.m. during winter months. For more information about Scout, call (619) 225-9925 or visit scout.com.
or email [email protected].