(“From huge antique wall clocks and oversized mooshy pillows to retro black and white prints and bronze fish they have almost everything you could want or fit in your tiny abode,” wrote one Yelp reviewer in 2008.) Thirty years later, the company had opened 57 stores from coast to coast, including a location on Broadway in lower Manhattan. A few years later, they opened a separate home decor store before combining the businesses under the Z Gallerie banner. Sibling trio Carole Malfatti and Joe and Mike Zeiden founded the company in 1979, opening a poster shop in Sherman Oaks, California, and framing posters in their parents’ garage at night. So where did the company go wrong? Was it the brand’s out-of-touch merchandising, or is Z Gallerie just another private equity victim? For those keeping score, the correct answer is probably a little bit of both.

And although the company says it will remain in business while closing some of its stores, this Chapter 11 go-round is likely to be very different. Home furnishings specialty chain Z Gallerie filed for bankruptcy yesterday-its second time to do so since 2009.

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