On opening the shop, again.
The first time I rented this space — in October of 2017 — I had eight makers, two clothing racks borrowed from my sister, and an unreasonable amount of optimism about how women shopped on State Street.
Nine years on, the rack situation is better. The optimism, somehow, is even worse — or maybe more stubborn — because the work is harder now and the stakes feel higher. Every season I drive a different route through the Rust Belt, the Hudson Valley, and the Great Lakes, and I sit at kitchen tables with people who still know exactly where their wool came from.
I don't believe clothes should travel further than the people wearing them. I think a coat should outlive a relationship. And I think shopping should feel less like a transaction and more like a long, unhurried conversation about what your real life actually looks like.
If you've never been in, please come. If you've been a hundred times, come for the hundred-and-first. We'll put a kettle on.