The ornate decor left behind in the former Great Wall restaurant has been joined by rows of shelves displaying Asian grocery items and antiques as Rose and Ed Lacsa prepare for the upcoming opening of Midwest Asian Variety Store.

The store, located at 3103 Kirkwood St., will open in about two weeks, giving Southeast Iowans wanting to try their hand at Filipino, Korean, Japanese, Thai or Chinese cuisine a place to purchase ingredients, or grab some snacks and bubble tea, while perusing a collection of antiques that Ed previously had at Eclectic Design and Antiques. 

"That's why I put the 'variety' in there," Ed said with a laugh of the store's name.

And in a few months, the Lacsas plan to begin offering carryout for cooked food such as egg rolls, noodles, kebabs and other Filipino food. They hope to expand to dine-in within the next year. 

"They are expecting it already that we serve food here," Ed said. "It’s a waste if this closed down or changed to another kind of business. The environment inside is so nice, we want to preserve it. We don’t want to move anything. It’s like a work of art."

Inside the building, a gold and red archway opens up to what was and again will be used for a dining area, its walls displaying Asian paintings and other artwork. 

"For the Chinese, the dragon is lucky, so I don’t want to remove them," Rose said.

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Rose is excited to be opening her business there, but she was sad to see the "Great Wall Restaurant" signage come down. She had worked there for 20 years until it closed in 2020 due to the pandemic. Rose had hoped the restaurant would reopen, but it never did. 

The Lacsas had moved to Iowa from Arkansas in 2000 for a structural engineer position that Ed took in Mount Pleasant. Before moving to Arkansas in 1996, they had lived in Singapore after a stint in Saudi Arabia, where Ed worked in construction design. They originally are from the Philippines. 

They opened their first Midwest Asian Variety Store about 10 years ago at the corner of Sunnyside and Roosevelt avenues, but between raising two young children and working other jobs, they found they did not have enough time to run the store and closed it down after about a year. 

"We were so busy with the kids," Ed said. "They were small then."

With their sons now grown, Ed and Rose decided to reopen the store in the same location this past March. It was well-received.

"A lot of Americans now, not only Asians, they are trying now to cook their own Asian food," Ed said. "They are experimenting because of this Facebook, YouTube, they learned how to cook Asian food. They buy ingredients here and they say they're cooking." 

Parking there, however, was limited and the space they were in did not have the utility hookups needed to support the equipment they had purchased to prepare food for carryout. 

Meanwhile, the Great Wall sat empty.

"We were driving and I was joking to my husband," Rose recalled. "I said in two years, if that one's not full, that one's ours."

That dream since has become a reality, and the Lacsas have spent the past several months cleaning and preparing the space for their business. 

They removed the seating from half of the dining area and put in its place the grocery area filled with an array of sauces, condiments, egg noodles, instant noodle cups, curry pastes, seasoning packets, egg roll wraps, shredded coconut, fish balls, French sponge cake, pork asado buns, tea bags and bubble tea. 

There's also a variety of rices — a clear favorite for Rose, who after 26 years of living in the U.S. still prefers the cereal over the bread products favored by her children.

"Rice is a common cereal for Asians," Ed said. 

"Rice is my life," Rose added with a laugh.

There's short rice, which Ed said is used for sushi; basmati rice; Thai jasmine brown rice; and sweet rice, which is good for sticky rice and cakes.

Rose will oversee the grocery side, while Ed, who still works full-time as an engineer, will manage the antique side. 

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The party room at the back of the building remains closed for a yet-to-be decided future use, and Ed still has some work to do on the kitchen's plumbing before the Lacsas can start serving up dishes from their home country.

Once it opens later this month, the store will be open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays.

Editor's note: This report has been updated to correct the location of the former Midwest Asian Variety Store at the corner of Roosevelt and Sunnyside avenues. 

Michaele Niehaus covers business, development, environment and agriculture for The Hawk Eye. She can be reached at mniehaus@thehawkeye.com.