General News, Latest News, Locally made pottery

We have moved to Aro Street

Phew! That was close. The afternoon before the Covid-19 Lockdown we finished moving into our new place at 93a Aro St. Aro Valley.

We had to scrub, clean, paint and move the entire shop in just four days.

This picture is just some of the South Coast Collective and Verdant team near the end of the last day. All of us looking pretty tired!

Janette, Rosey, Rowan and Demelza.
Janette, Rosey, Rowan and Demelza.

🙏🙏🙏I would like to thank everyone who helped out. I am really grateful for the help we received. Thank you especially to the following:

• Rosey from Rosemary O’Hara Pottery. She has been an absolute trooper for four long days scrubbing the floors, filling in holes, painting and making sure the painting actually got done properly. It’s been physically demanding.

Rosey at the very end of the day with her Pots behind her

•Rowan from Global Wood Rework for volunteering and painting the outside of the building, dismantling and lifting.

Rowan posing and painting

•John of Capital Blinds for just turning up in between jobs and dismantling everything at the old shop; especially our temperamental sign, which for a moment there I thought we were going to have to leave behind.

•Anthea of 29 native bees & Anthea Grob Clay, for looking after the kids on Tuesday when daycare closed with no notice, and helping shift and clean at both shops.

•David and Ryan of Burns Upholstery for turning up to do a load at the last minute, when I thought we weren’t going to make it in time.

And thanks to staff;

• Demelza has been amazing over the last four days, doing everything that needed doing with no complaints.

Janette & Demelza at the end Day 1 cleaning, scrubbing and painting

• Alex for just getting stuck in and packing anything that needed packing.

• Damian (the hubby) for his support, car loads and ensuring we still got fed, even though he had his own work stuff to organise in the craziness of the last 48 hours we had notice of the Lockdown.

And lastly the SCC & Verdant Team would also like to thank the Aro Valley community. We have had many people stop by (keeping their 2 metre distance) to say hello and welcome to the neighbourhood. That has really kept us going and feeling positive in these very trying times!

I am truely grateful and overwhelmed by the help and support. – Janette

Here’s what we did manage to set up:

The table we managed to set up before Lockdown
Eco Interiors, Interiors, organic fabric

New Zealand designed fabrics

Did you know that we have a large selection of New Zealand and even Wellington designed fabrics?

Anthea one of our potters is also a fabric designer. We have a few of her fabrics and homewares in store.

They are all made with organic and hemp fabrics!

One of the few NZ fabric houses that we regular source from is Hemptech. They regularly engage NZ and Australian artists to design fabrics for them. The result is a lovely cohesive and timeless range that stands the test of time. One of the best things is the designs are all printed here in NZ on 100% Eco Linen – mostly grown and woven in Belgium where the worlds best quality linen comes from.

Eco Linen is ecological due to the way it is grown and processed. Linen requires very minimal pesticides and fertilisers and requires no extra irrigation. When the fibre is processed, it is dew retted. Meaning they harvest the linen and leave it on the ground for the fibre to be ‘rotted’ out of the leaf. This usually takes weeks rather than days for this process to occur. Cheaper linens on the market quicken this process by using chemicals.

What do you think? I think we certainly have some talented designers within our shores!

You can view samples of all of these fabrics in our shop. Or we are slowly adding them to the Verdant Living website.

Janette