Musical Instrument Store Near Me in Brooklyn: RetroFret Vintage Guitars

RetroFret Vintage Guitars occupies 87 Luquer Street in Carroll Gardens, a few sidewalks from the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, and it is the kind of place where a 1928 Martin and a mandola from the 1920s share a room with banjos, ukuleles and effects pedals. If your search for a musical instrument store near me is really a search for something old, odd and playable, this Brooklyn showroom is open to anyone who walks in during business hours.

The business grew out of a repair bench. According to a 2020 profile in Industry, Steve Uhrik opened his first shop, Uhrik Luthiers, on Mercer Street in SoHo in 1973. RetroFret's own history dates the vintage business to 1983, when Uhrik, the owner and head luthier, made the first sale, driven by an early fascination with electronics and with how instruments actually work.

Uhrik has described how customers kept asking him to help sell their old instruments, and by the 1990s he was buying pieces to repair and putting some on display. For about 35 years the shop lived in Gowanus, in a building put up in 1913 as Brooklyn's first purpose-built ASPCA. In 2017 it moved to the current Luquer Street space in Carroll Gardens, where the showroom and the restoration facility share one address.

The new space was designed around fragile instruments. The 2020 profile describes a computer-controlled humidification system and a glass-enclosed sound room for electric instruments, so you can plug in a vintage Stratocaster without filling the acoustic room with noise. The shop calls the result a private showroom experience with a museum-quality restoration and repair facility on the premises.

Expect variety rather than rows of identical stock. The showroom invites visitors to browse and play acoustic and electric guitars, basses, banjos, mandolins, ukuleles, effects pedals and amps, and a 2020 profile of the shop spotted lutes, double-neck guitars, lap steels and a theremin on the floor. It feels closer to a working archive than a retail store.

Recent arrivals show the range. In October 2026 the shop listed a 1928 C. F. Martin 00-42 flat-top at $38,500, a pre-war pearl-trimmed 00, the middle size of Martin's three models then, and a 1941 Gibson L-0 at $6,000. A Fender Stratocaster that the listing dates to 1960 and 1963 was priced at $12,000, the kind of instrument whose paperwork matters as much as its tone.

The folk side of the room is just as deep. A 1964 Clifford Glenn mountain banjo with five strings was listed at $1,450, a flat-back, bent-top mandola built around 1927 by the Larson brothers for the Wm. Stahl label at $2,750, and a new 2026 round-body acoustic mandolin by John Liestman, with 14 small sound holes in the inner rim, at $3,600. For mandolin and banjo players, the fretted-instrument range here goes well beyond guitars.

Plenty of players know RetroFret first as a repair shop. The services list covers setups, electric repairs, structural restorations, neck sets, fretwork, pickup installation and vintage restorations, and the bench team includes luthier Mark Dobyn alongside Uhrik. In October 2026, though, the website says the repair shop is at capacity for now, so treat a visit as a showroom trip rather than a drop-off.

That pause does not affect buying or consigning. The shop says it is interested in purchasing or consigning vintage guitars, amps, banjos, mandolins and basses. Bring photos, serial numbers and any paperwork you have; on vintage instruments, provenance and originality move the number more than shine.

The showroom is open Monday through Friday from 12 pm to 7 pm and Saturday from 12 pm to 6 pm, and it is closed on Sunday. Walk-ins are welcome during those hours; the site invites visitors to stop by any time the showroom is open. Weekday evenings give you the longest window, which is useful if you want to compare two or three pre-war guitars back to back without rushing.

Treat the instruments with the care their age deserves. Ask before taking anything off the wall, remove belt buckles or keep a cloth on your lap, and let the staff tune or adjust a fragile piece. If you want a particular house string, the shop sells its own Retro Set strings made by La Bella, a small souvenir for visitors who leave without a four- or five-figure guitar.

Even fans admit the location is a little off the beaten path. The nearest subway is Carroll Street on the F and G lines, roughly half a mile away, and from there you walk west through Carroll Gardens toward the expressway. The R train at Fourth Avenue–Ninth Street is another option, a longer walk to the east. Keep an eye on the street numbers as you walk down Luquer Street.

If you are carrying a case, a cab drops you at the door, but the train is the simpler choice for most visitors. The walk from Carroll Street station passes brownstones and the deep front-yard gardens the neighborhood is known for, and it makes a calm prelude before you start pulling century-old instruments off the wall.

Carroll Gardens is an Italian-American neighborhood with a serious food scene, and two classics are close. Frankies 457 Spuntino on Court Street is open seven days a week for lunch and dinner, a reliable plan for a meal after an afternoon of playing old guitars. It is a good place to talk over a guitar you are not yet sure you can justify, with a plate of pasta between you and the decision.

For dinner, Lucali on Henry Street is the famous one, a small pizza room that opens for dinner only and draws a crowd as soon as it does. It is closed on Tuesday, it takes cash only, and it is BYOB, so stop at a wine shop on the way. Pairing a vintage-guitar afternoon with Lucali is about as Brooklyn as a Saturday gets.