Our Origin Story
The brainchild of Founder Mahan MacVicar, House of the Scarab is the culmination of the many years she has spent honing her skills, coupled with her passion and desire to serve the collector community in new and innovative ways.
Mission
To preserve and enhance the cherished relics of our past through the thoughtful marriage of artisanship and technical expertise, safeguarding their innate value for the next generation.
A Passion for Paper, Ink and History
Mahan frequently jokes that her “happy place” is a used bookstore. The unique scent of old books and the texture of aged paper under her fingers brings her a tremendous amount of joy and nostalgia. In fact, Mahan has a reverence and respect for all objects with a history or a story. A lifelong artist, Mahan appreciates the beauty and character of items that have withstood the test of time and survived to provide a glimpse into history.
The Artist and the Perfectionist
As an artist, Mahan has spent decades honing her skills and dexterity, building the muscle memory required to perform intricate and delicate tasks. An ardent perfectionist by nature, she pays impeccable attention to detail and is never satisfied until a task is done flawlessly. Coupled with her vast experience in artisanship, is Mahan’s dedication to life-long learning. She has a voracious mind that devours new information and is always striving to improve, expand and refine itself. This habit of continual learning has led Mahan to be an out-of-the-box thinker, always innovating and distilling processes to make them more effective and efficient. When she puts her mind to something, Mahan is always “all in,” never faltering, cutting corners, or taking shortcuts. She is dedicated to excellence and works hard every day to achieve the highest possible potential in every endeavor she embraces.
A Beautiful Union
Mahan met her soulmate, Jason, in 1998 at the tender age of just nineteen. The two hit it off immediately and have been inseparable ever since. It was Jason who initially introduced Mahan to the world of superheroes and comic books. He jokingly refers to her as his “Scarlet Witch,” something that she doesn’t seem to mind. Jason eventually passed on his love of comic books to their daughter and since that time this interest has become a family obsession.
Cultivating the Craft
For many years, Mahan has been cleaning and pressing her family’s own comic book collection. She began doing so because both she and Jason noticed a significant gap in the marketplace of professionals who provided this much needed service. As she tends to do, Mahan decided to take matters into her own hands and learn the art herself. Soon, family and friends began asking her to work on their books and documents. And so eventually, the seeds of the idea of brining her much needed skills to the marketplace, began to germinate in Mahan’s mind.
Bringing Artisanship to the Collector Community
Mahan is proud to offer her skills and perfectionist work ethic to the widely underserved collector community. She understands that to most collectors their books are not only financial assets, but also items that they love and value beyond their simple monetary worth. As such, she is dedicated to treating each item that she is entrusted with, with the utmost respect and reverence, and to doing everything in her power to enhance and preserve these important pieces of history for generations to come.
