UPDATE: No Disappearing Act Here

Barry Taylor and 8-year-old Alana Jennings laugh about a magic trick last year at Barry's Magic Shop's old location. The store now has more spacious digs near White Flint Mall. (By Bill O'leary -- The Washington Post)

Earlier this year, it didn't look good for Barry's Magic Shop. As part of a revitalization project in downtown Wheaton, Montgomery County officials had paid nearly $1 million to buy the building that housed the store, one of the Washington area's only remaining specialty magic emporiums. And co-owners Barry Taylor and Susan Kang said they couldn't afford to find a new space.

After more than 30 years, it seemed that their stock of rubber chickens and magic rings would disappear, as if in one of the tricks they'd sold to thousands of budding magicians.

But in April, County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) announced a deal to relocate the shop to a building on Nicholson Lane just up the street from White Flint Mall. The county would provide $260,000 over five years to help pay for costs associated with the move. At a news conference to announce the plan, Taylor celebrated the way he knew best: He pulled a dove out of a sack.

And so in August, Kang and Taylor threw open the doors of a bigger, brighter Barry's Magic Shop. The new store is more than twice the size of the old Georgia Avenue shop and includes a 40-seat theater, complete with rich, burgundy curtains, where Taylor and other guest magicians do shows and teach tricks.

"I have to pinch myself,'' Kang said recently as she surveyed the spacious, second-floor shop. "We're so lucky."

The new space provides ample room for the husband-and-wife team to display an extensive collection of magical items. There are sections for magic coins, magic silks, new and beginner magic. There's even a Gag Department, complete with plastic barf and rubber dog poo (though, Kang said, they are running low on trick bagels).

Although some in the community voiced concern about the subsidy provided to Taylor and Kang, county spokesman Patrick Lacefield noted that in the past officials have provided financial support for businesses forced to relocate to make way for building projects. A decade ago, several other Wheaton businesses, including an Irish pub and a Peruvian chicken shop, received payments because they were being closed or relocated, he said.

At Leggett's town hall meetings, Lacefield recalled, the fate of Barry's Magic Shop generated as many comments as the county's traffic problems.

On a recent evening, three magicians sat at a poker table tucked in a corner of the store comparing notes on card tricks. Such a space wouldn't have been possible in their previous quarters, Kang said.

Nick DeCiutiis, a retired bank manager, gifted magician and longtime Barry's customer, recalled how worried he was that the shop would disappear. The new shop, he said, provides "a place where local magicians can meet."

"I really think this is going to revitalize magic,'' Kang said as the store's mascot, Frankie the Wonder Dog, rested at her feet. "I feel like this was destiny.''

-- Lori Aratani