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Business & Tech

Spruce Home & Garden Brings Eclectic Home Decor to West Hartford Center

New store offers traditional garden and home products with a contemporary touch.

Winter is approaching quickly and we will be spending more time inside, hibernating from the cold days and long nights. It also means that many of us will be holiday entertaining with a steady stream of guests in and out of our homes.

For those of you who feel the urge to freshen up your abode in anticipation, West Hartford’s latest addition to the retail scene will be just the place to visit.

Spruce Home & Garden, located at 973 Farmington Ave., is opening its doors for business today. The store offers what Spruce President and co-owner Steven Wilburn describes as, “an eclectic mix of garden and home products with a distinctive urban mix of contemporary and traditional.”

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Wilburn knows a thing or two about the retail scene. He worked for Saks Fifth Avenue for 20 years in their corporate office, most recently as a Senior Creative Director of Visual Merchandising and Store Design. He left Saks in 2005 to start a company that installed Christmas decorations he designed for high-end retailers such as Cartier, Tiffany, and Bergdorf’s.

In 2007, Wilburn sold the business and formed a wholesale import/export business with Hong Kong executive Robert Tseng. He and Tseng produced garden pots and accessories under the name “Spruce” with wholesale facilities located in New York City and Atlanta. The name was chosen for its relation to nature and also to represent the “sprucing up” of a home.

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The company branched out (no pun intended) a year and half ago when it entered the retail end of the business by opening its first Spruce Home & Garden store in New Milford, stocked with the company’s own products, as well as collections from carefully vetted artists and designers. It is this exclusivity and particularity that Willburn intends to continue to bring to his West Hartford customers.

“One of our goals as a company is to be a great partner with the people we purchase from. We feel that if we are a good partner with them then we can ask them for personal appearances and truly distinctive merchandise,” said Wilburn. Citing quality, style and value as the three tenets of his company’s vision, Wilburn is committed to keeping his store affordable, yet stylish. “We really try to keep the price points low and as razor sharp as we can. Our furniture is incredible because it is so well-built, yet our price points are going to beat all of the big guys out there. You get a lot of style for the money.”

Located in the space formerly occupied by E.L. Wilde, the interior remains two stories but it has been remodeled with a fresh coat of taupe paint on the walls and a rich dark brown on the ceiling. There’s also new display shelving and overhead track lighting. The result is a modern, calm atmosphere that highlights rather than detracts from the wares on the tables and shelves.

In the front of the store, shoppers will find home décor items, jewelry and other small goods. In the back, there’s a selection of garden pots that look strikingly like traditional, heavy clay but are actually easily transportable fiberglass. A towering trio of polyresin and fiberglass cranes designed by a Chinese artist and produced by the Spruce company stands proudly amidst the display tables. Because of their durable material, they can be displayed inside or outside.

And while the crane triplets might not fit into everyone’s budget, there are candles, scarves, body care products, pretty votive candle holders and earrings, to note just a few items, that are very easy on the wallet. 

The lower level houses furniture with upholstered pieces of fabric and leather from Bernhardt Interiors, the upper end line of the well established furniture production company. In addition to the upholstered furniture, other pieces like tables and chairs will be offered, most coming through Spruce’s own wholesale division.

At 4,000 square feet, the West Hartford location is larger than the New Milford store or the location in Westport, which is expected to open on the Boston Post Road in another month.  

Wilburn is very optimistic about opening up stores in a challenging retail environment. ”We have a long-term goal of opening three to five stores per year and we are right on track. If we are able to grow in this down market, then when we hit a good market, we will have stores that are well established, well placed and ready to churn and be profitable for us. This is our plan, our strategy.”

And how does he feel about the community of West Hartford? “We feel that West Hartford will be very successful. Probably outperform New Milford in a year. The town is an ideal New England community and the perfect place to launch our second store and kick off our expansion.”

Spruce Home & Garden will be sharing a portion of its opening day sales with the Hartford affiliate of “Dress For Success.” A custom T-shirt will also be available for purchase and 100 percent of the profits will be added to Spruce’s donation.

For more information, please contact Spruce’s Director of Stores, Shannon, at 860-355-4383 or email her at Shannon@sprucehomeandgarden.com. You may also go to the store’s website www.sprucehomeandgarden.com.

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