May 27, 2026
When Barefoot closes this Sunday, State College will not just lose a shoe store. It will lose one of the people who helped make downtown feel alive.
For more than 51 years, Art Fine helped shape the personality of Happy Valley through businesses that were never simply about shoes or clothing. Barefoot. Metro. People’s Nation. AJ Fine’s Sample Sale. His stores became part of the rhythm of downtown itself, places where students gathered, conversations started, styles emerged, and memories were made.
If you spent time around Penn State over the last five decades, chances are Art Fine was part of your story somewhere along the way.
And downtown was more interesting because he was in it.
Art graduated from Penn State with an art degree after first enduring two painful years studying accounting.
“Accounting was torture,” he laughs.
But Penn State itself? He loved every minute of it.
“1967 to 1971 was the best time ever to be a Penn State student,” Fine said. “Music, politics, culture… we were all together. We were one.”
You can still hear the emotion in his voice when he talks about that era. There was creativity. Energy. Conversation. Community. In many ways, Art Fine spent the next fifty years trying to recreate that feeling through retail.
After graduation, he spent four years working in his father’s bridal business in Philadelphia. But State College kept pulling him back.
So, in 1975, he opened his first store on Calder Way inside what had once been a two-car garage. The store sold Earth Shoes, which at the time were exploding in popularity.
But Art did not just open a store.
He created a feeling.
He bought a Scarlet Macaw parrot and walked around downtown wearing an Earth Shoes T-shirt with the bird perched on his shoulder. Before customers ever stepped inside, they already knew exactly who Art Fine was. Colorful. Creative. Unconventional. Impossible to ignore.
And he understood something many retailers never fully grasp.
People remember how you make them feel.
About nine months after opening, disaster struck. Back then, people smoked inside stores, and a cigarette tossed into a trash can started a fire that badly damaged the business.
Most people would have panicked.
Art turned it into a “Great Fire Sale.”
That was Art Fine in a nutshell. Optimistic, resilient, and always finding a creative way forward.
But Art’s real talent was not simply selling products. It was sensing where culture was headed before it arrived in small-town America.
Over the years, he introduced Happy Valley to brands long before they became household names. Birkenstock. Timberland. Earth Shoes. UGG. Steve Madden. Rockport. Clogs.
Long before Starbucks became part of everyday American life, Metro became the first place in State College serving Starbucks coffee under the “Proudly We Brew Starbucks” banner.
For many people in town, that was their first taste of modern coffee culture.
On football weekends and busy afternoons downtown, Metro buzzed with espresso steam, loud conversations, students lingering for hours, and the energy that made State College feel uniquely alive.
Again and again, Art saw what people were looking for before they fully knew it themselves.
But the best thing he ever found in business was Nancy.
The two met when Nancy walked into the store to buy a pair of Birkenstocks. That moment changed everything.
Customers may have known the stores through Art’s personality, but the soul of the business was built together. Nancy brought warmth, instinct, creativity, and steadiness that transformed the stores from retail spaces into places people genuinely loved returning to.
Together, they built not just successful businesses, but a family and a life deeply rooted in the community. They raised two sons, now 45 and 41, while operating as many as five stores at once during the height of downtown State College retail.
Ask Art about the success of the business, and he quickly shifts the credit to Nancy.
“Nancy made the business,” he says.
And you can tell he means it.
What Art and Nancy created became bigger than retail. Generations of Penn State students worked for them. Customers returned years later with children of their own. Their stores became part of the experience of growing up in Happy Valley. Discovering your style. Meeting friends downtown. Grabbing coffee. Finding something unexpected. Feeling connected to the life of the community.
That kind of independent downtown entrepreneur is becoming increasingly rare now.
Online shopping changed habits. National chains changed expectations. Retail became more transactional.
But for more than half a century, Art Fine stayed true to something timeless.
Create energy. Treat people well. Make downtown feel alive.
At 77 years old, he says he is finally ready to slow down, travel, spend time with family, and enjoy life beyond retail.
“This has been a great ride,” Fine said. “I loved all my customers, my employees, and I will miss you all. And now it’s time to enjoy the rest of my life.”
This Sunday, the lights at Barefoot will go dark for the final time.
But what Art Fine built will outlast the storefronts.
Because for generations of Penn Staters, part of downtown will always look a little like an Art Fine store. Alive. Welcoming. Unpredictable. Creative. Full of possibility.
And State College is better because Art Fine spent 51 years pouring himself into it.
