Apologises for the lack of posts this week it has been beyond crazy. New products arriving every day have swamped the store and it’s been a bit of a battle to keep up with it all. Having said that we have some incredible beautiful pieces in store – my favs include a beautiful little collection of mouth blown glass bud vases that look really vintagy and are perfect presents being priced at between £12 and £20 depending on the size, oversized gold leaf ladles from a collective in Berlin and some beyond beautiful textiles. I will take pictures and post for you guys if I ever get my act together!
Onto today I was just reading the NY Times on line and was surprised to here that Shabby Chic had filed for bankruptcy due to an expansion programme that was not sustainable which saddened me as I know only to well how scary it is. We had been asked about a year and a bit ago to open a retail store in the basement of the Plaza Hotel in NY – at the time the Plaza’s retail outlet was being touted as a European hip collective of cool stores and we were beyond close to signing. As more and more European stores pulled out of the deal we decided (after many tears on my part) to do the same. As awful as it felt, as I am so desperate to have a concession or store in the US it felt like a good thing to do – and in hindsight it was (a month later my husband was made redundant). Fast forward a year and Graham is fully ensconced in the business – it has been our best ever year and one day I know my dream of opening Stateside will come true. In the meantime Rachel Ashwell, owner of Shabby Chic has brought back her business and is opening three stores one in London and two in the States. So here’s to Rachel – wishing her the very best of success and below one of her iconic sofas. Rachel made shabby, wrinkled lived in sofas chic – and I take my hat off to anything that’s a bit wrinkled, lived in and scruffy!
All the best to her as well, I know as a small business how difficult it is right now, not many people has got money left to spend on beautiful handmade good. I am very positive that things will improve in the near future, I am not giving up just yet!!
I went to Origin yesterday and it was packed with visitors and exhibitors, so it shows things are still happening…
Exactly the attitude – don’t give up and fight – am a strong believer that that pays off.
I didn’t feel that bad that Shabby Chic went bankrupt. I’m surprised it took so long. Her store is so grossly over-priced it’s offensive. People finally got smart and realized it’s easy to make shabby chic on your own. The quality of her own line of goods was crap too. Survival of the fittest.