WICHITA — When Polly Peake was preparing to open her At Home With Style shop near Central and Woodlawn this summer, she encouraged her friend Abbe Doll to sell some of her repurposed furniture there.
“The goal was just kind of to see how I would do,” Doll says of her All Dolled Up section within the store.
“I sold out in two weeks,” she says. “Before I knew it, I had people calling me asking if I could do their old, ugly furniture.”
She now has a waiting list.
“Everybody has project pieces. ‘Oh, I’ll do that some day.’ It was just kind of a snowball effect.”
Doll decided to not only get her own space but to create a collective for other women looking to do similar retail.
In March, she’s opening the Cottage Collective at the Green Elephant Village near Central and Hillside, a 3,000-square-foot home for All Dolled Up and what Doll calls six “awesome gals doing awesome products.”
Abbe Doll at her future Cottage Collective and new All Dolled Up store.
“A lot of these gals had been waiting and hoping for a place like this, but we were all kind of too small to do it on our own,” Doll says.
Cottage Collective will include:
– A Prairie Market, Courtney Browning’s vintage home decor
– Marigold Road, Mindy Harris’ hand-crafted and vintage accessories
– A Lady With A Baby, Tiffany Classen’s hand-crafted wreaths, pillows, aprons and other items
– Poema Creations, Missy Chester’s handmade polymer clay jewelry (she’ll also offer workshops)
– Zerbers, Tara Shepherd’s handmade baby and children’s items
– Paper Goods Creative, Jennifer Wenzel’s paper, gift and party supplies
“We’ve all been stay-at-home moms or home-based businesses,” Doll says.
She says she’s appreciative of Peake helping her take her business to the next level.
“I’m pretty tickled,” Peake says. “It sounds like it’s going to be a neat little idea and place.”
Once Doll finishes phasing out of At Home With Style, Peake will use that area for a baby section of her store.
Doll says each of the businesses at the Cottage Collective is budget friendly.
“It’s kind of my take on a modern antique mall,” she says of the concept. “When you leave, you’ve got a one-of-a-kind treasure.”