West Hartford-Based Vivenda Offers Vintage and Bricolage Products

West Hartford has no shortage of small businesses that have cropped up recently, including Quirk on Oakwood Avenue and Lila Mae in Blue Back Square.

Add Vivenda (“manor” in Portuguese) to that list.

Started by West Hartford resident Mariana Sgarbi and Flavia Falci of Glastonbury, Vivenda is an online store for “one-of-a-kind pieces of home decor,” according to a press release.

Vivenda’s specialty is bricolage, the French word for repurpose, in which Sgarbi and Falci take an item and refurbish it into something entirely different for home decoration.

“We have have new or old objects that we make into a new object with a different purpose,” Sgarbi said in a telephone interview Friday. “We’ve got a collection of vintage vases and we repainted them with vibrant colors. We take kitchen utensils to decorate for the kitchen. We do things for kids rooms. We try to use Legos as a way of creating home decorations.

“That’s the most fun part. You get to do something totally different with an object you wouldn’t think would be used for that purpose.”

Sgarbi and Falci said in a press release that  Vivenda “is for shoppers who either get overwhelmed by Ebay and Etsy or just simply don't trust those websites to get vintage home accents.

Most items go for between $20 and $80.

“They are affordable prices for unique items,” Sgarbi said.

The two met in West Hartford about three months ago and decided to combine their backgrounds (Flavia - fashion designer,  and  Mariana - business lawyer) to start their own online business.

The two just launched the website last week.

“It’s been fun,” Sgarbi said.