As most of you know two weekends ago I celebrated the Grand Opening of Waiting On Martha Home, and while I still haven’t had time to catch my breath, I wanted to take a moment to share a peek into the weekend, the design, and a little into the process of how I got here.   

Opening my own brick & mortar shoppe has been a dream of mine for years.  Almost five years, and four different pop-up shop test runs if I’m being exact.  So believe me when I say getting to this moment has not been an easy journey.  

First I had to tackle the question of, “do I even want a retail storefront?”  Retail is not for the faint of heart; I lost many a night’s sleep making pro and con lists over this question.  But, in the end I knew this dream of being a Shoppe Girl has been in my heart well before there was a WOM.  

So with that box checked the next question was “where?”  This was definitely one of, if not the hardest part.  Location, location, location was of course key, but I also had a vision of what I wanted the storefront to look like.  And then the clientele of course; I needed to put roots in a place where Waiting On Martha Home would be welcomed and supported, and most importantly shopped!  Enter the Vinings Jubilee, an adorable neighborhood of speciality stores and restaurants tucked in historic Vinings Village Atlanta.  It was, it is, the perfect place for our flagship store!

Lastly, design.  This was by far the easiest, and most fun part of the whole process.  Having been dreaming this dream for so long I knew exactly what I wanted to do down to the very last detail.  First things first, demo.  

I worked closely with Rob and his amazing team from Vision Construction.  With the help of Vision we knocked down walls, tore up all the flooring, moved electrical, exposed windows that were hidden…which I’ll never quite understand, painted, wallpapered, and built out 8 custom shelving and cabinetry units and 1 custom beverage bar.

And while Vision was a dream to work with, I can’t give them all the construction credit.  My father, the talented man that he is, built by hand…in my parent’s garage no less, the most gorgeous check out station you’ll ever see. Plus he built the fireplace, laid the custom flooring in the backroom and with a little help from the hubs hung a room full of shiplap.  As Kat says, “dad is a unicorn.”

For the actual design details, it really breaks down to the paint, wallpaper, countertops, and flooring.  

For the flooring in the main room, I chose a wide plank, warm toned maple colored laminate wood flooring that I swear you’d never know wasn’t real wood.  This was able to save me quite a bit of cash, plus it’s so nice not having to worry about it getting scratched or damaged.  

In the back room, I went with hand-stamped laminate wood tiles from Charleston designer Mirth Studios.  I stumbled upon these tiles on Instagram and immediately fell in love.  Available in 40+ patterns, and with a 15 year warranty I knew they would be just the right amount of pizzaz I was looking for, plus the Sweet Cecilia design paired perfectly with my Farrow & Ball Pale Powder shiplap walls.  I loved the tiles so much, we are now the exclusive retail partner of Mirth Studios.  So if you’re in Atlanta, stop by the Shoppe and check some of the designs out for yourself! 

The wallpaper had to be grasscloth; no question in my mind.  My favorite line of grasscloth currently is from Bradley USA.  The quality is amazing, and it’s a better cost option than others. And though I loved all of the grasscloth patterns, colors, and textures I ended up going with the Jute Grasscloth in Gleam.  

Just as the wallpaper had to be grasscloth, the paint had to be Farrow and Ball.  If you remember I visited Farrow and Ball’s headquarters in England last September and actually saw the entire paint process from start to finish, and there’s just no one who does it quite like F&B.  

I used Chappell Green in lacquer, Pale Powder in both a flat and semi gloss, Dimity in lacquer, and All White in both a flat and semi gloss.  There really are no words to describe just how gorgeous it all turned out.  Honestly, the coloring evokes just the right amount of happy, calm, and bright…pure perfection.

Lastly, the marble.  This was a difficult task.  The marble needed to go in four very large places: the check out station, wrapping station, beverage bar, and fireplace.  Measuring to be at least 2 full slabs of the exact same marble, which meant digging through remanent pieces that are always more reasonably priced was not an option.  And of course I wanted thick, beautiful, white carrera-esq marble.  Not granite, not quartz, not laminate…marble.  

After visiting a few marble yards, and finding nothing in our budge, I was referred to Elise from Stone Select.  Thank God for Elise!! You see Elise is basically a stone-marble-granite dealer.  I told her what I wanted and she searched all the yards and found it.  The best part, she found it fast and under budget! Seriously, if you are in Atlanta and need marble Elise is your gal!

And with that, and a lot of product styling, my pinch-me moment of finally opening my Waiting On Martha Home doors was ready.  

I’ll be putting the finishing touches on the place over the next few weeks, and invite you to come join the fun; sip on coffee in our custom coffee cups, treat yourself to a little “sercie” or “happy”, find gifts for quite literally everyone, or let me help in designing that custom piece of furniture you’ve been dreaming about.  And be on the lookout for upcoming events at Waiting on Martha Home.  

One more quick note; thank you.  I was thoroughly blown away by the support of WOM’s family and friends who came out to shop on opening day regardless of the torrential down pour.  To my online customers and friends who sent so many well wishes.  And of course, it meant the world to me to see the amazing response of the Vinings community.  Thank you to Kat, Liz, Steph, and the entire WOM Team.  To my parents, who have worked tirelessly my entire life to give me everything I could have wanted and needed, who have supported my dreams, and most importantly have loved me unconditionally.  And lastly, to my husband, who along with Addison is always my biggest cheerleader.  THANK YOU.  The best is yet to come Friends! Truly, MKR

P.S. Be sure to follow along on the shoppe’s Instagram and Facebook page for exciting updates, special discounts and more! xo