Mara is a bridal and prom shop at 103 N. Main Street in downtown Charles City. Wedding gowns and tuxedos are at 103. Prom, homecoming and pageant dresses are next door at 101 N. Main, in the space shared with Cardigan, the women's boutique the same owner opened in February 2021. Mara has been open since 2017. The downtown building used to be the Prichard Law Office. Owner Tiffany Rottinghaus told KIMT the February 2024 move here from Kelly Street took the shop from about 1,400 square feet to nearly 5,000.
How the two sides work
Bridal at 103 runs on appointments in three private suites. Two of them are on the second floor, so call ahead if stairs are a problem. The prom side at 101 is walk-in; no appointment is needed to look. The two doors keep separate hours. Prom is closed Sundays and Mondays and open Saturday morning into early afternoon. One number, (641) 228-3301, reaches both.
Labels you can try on here
Five brands list Mara as a stockist on their own sites:
- Jovani
- Terani
- La Femme
- Alyce Paris
- Dave & Johnny
That's national prom stock in a town of about 7,400 people, and a good reason to try a gown on rather than order one blind. Mara also lists menswear and tuxedos, so a couple can handle both halves of prom in one trip.
Prom season in Charles City
Charles City High School, home of the Comets, is the only high school in the district. Prom was Saturday, May 3 in 2025 and April 18 in 2026, with coronation in the Comet Gym at the middle school. So the racks at 101 get picked over through February and March. Mara dresses also show up at proms in the smaller districts around Floyd County. That's part of why the Charles City Press has called the shop a destination business rather than a neighborhood one.
This is a downtown trip, not a mall trip. Mara sits on a working Main Street in the county seat, a few blocks from the Cedar River and the whitewater course the city built there, the first of its kind in Iowa. Other independent shops share the same stretch of North Main, so a fitting can be the start of an afternoon rather than the whole reason to come.