I didn’t know a lot about a lot of things when I opened this business four years ago. For example, I didn’t know anything about decorating a retail shop. Lucky for me, I had an interior designer friend named Amy Thebault. In early June of 2013, Amy met me at my empty, white-walled, and not-yet-opened bra shop. I was shooting to open for business at the end of the month. The walls needed some color before we did much else.
Amy showed up and looked around and like boom boom boom made suggestions of what to put where and what colors would look good on the walls. I really wanted to use hot pink in the color scheme – the same hot pink color that was in the already-designed JOY logo. I was psyched Amy kind of liked that idea, but suggested we needed a contrast color too. Full disclosure that I’m not sure if she used the actual word “contrast” (these terms probably matter to interior designers), but I do know she suggested that we use another color to compliment both the hot pink and the merchandise that would soon be filling the walls. She suggested a muted brown. I must admit that I didn’t quite get it, but she was really sure it would look great. I trusted her and went with it.
With the colors for the shop decided, it was time to talk about the color of the dressing room walls. I asked Amy if there was a color that was flattering. I’ve been in dressing rooms with drab walls and horrible lighting where I looked and felt terrible and ugh…I did not want that in my bra shop! I envisioned our dressing rooms to be sacred spaces where women would feel comfortable and empowered to find their joy from the inside out. The colors of the walls mattered to me. They mattered a lot.
Within a second, she suggested turquoise. “Everybody looks good in turquoise,” she said. I was immediately brought decades back to my grandmother’s living room on Windsor Park Drive in Coventry, RI. Her walls were turquoise. I loved her and those days of my childhood so much. Turquoise sounded perfect.
Amy whipped out one of those color wheel things and flipped to the blues. We both pointed to a perfect turquoise. What has happened in our dressing rooms in the past four years is nothing short of magical. The women, the stories, the histories, the discoveries, the compassion, the power, the joy… All of it surrounded by the walls and the love of “Fairy Tale Blue.” Don’t you love how they name paint colors?
Grateful to all of you that have trusted us to help you in those dressing rooms. Grateful for so much and for Amy. There’s such a long story to tell.
Yours in colors and fairy tales,
Joy
