Owner of gentlemen’s club now operating at Seneca & Maple say Doc, Marty may have to go
Marty McFly and Doc Brown have survived five years on the side of the building at 1021 W Maple that over the years has seen a new business move in every few years. The most recent tenant was the short-lived Mynt Mojito Bar.
But soon, poor Marty’s picture will likely disappear, bit by bit, just like it did in the 1985 movie “Back to the Future.”
The building’s latest tenant is Spice of Life, a gentleman’s club that’s been open since December. But Tee Hadley, who manages the business, says the club’s traffic has been slow. One of the reasons, he speculates, is that — because customers park in the back and use the back entrance — the club doesn’t look like it’s ever open.
Recently, the owner invested in a logo redesign and replaced signage on the front and sides of the building. But that might not fix the problem, Hadley said, so the owner is considering painting over Marty and Doc — who local graffiti artist AeraOneLa added on the Seneca-facing side of the building in 2018, when The 1985 Arcade Bar & Grill was taking over the space.
Instead of the mural, Hadley said, they’d like to add a painting of their logo with an arrow pointing to parking in the back.
“We’ll probably get rid of it,” he said. “We were thinking about it. . . . We’ve been trying to find a good artist.”
Hadley said that he and his mother travel a lot, and when they do, they often check out clubs. They decided they wanted to open a gentlemen’s club — where female dancers perform but must keep pasties on their top halves — in Wichita.
The property at Seneca and Maple was already zoned for a gentlemen’s club as several have operated in the space over the years. The most recent was Babes Gentlemen’s Club in the early 2000s.
Spice of Life, Hadley said, is named after another gentlemen’s club that operated in the building in the 1980s. When they were trying to come up with a name for the business, Hadley said, his grandfather — who used to run gentlemen’s clubs himself — remembered that one.
Spice of Life has a full bar and also serves finger foods like chicken strips, burgers, wings, fries and fried okra, Hadley said. Its hours are 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays and 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. Sundays.
This story was originally published April 27, 2023 at 2:09 PM.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported the owner’s place of employment.
.jpg)