“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” - Martin Luther King
Read MoreA couple walked into Nectar, mid-December, Nat King Cole singing The Christmas Song, lights twinkling around the window displays of fancifully wrapped gifts, tables and furniture overflowing with items from all over the world.
Read MoreAt Nectar I witnessed relationship dynamics every day for 12 amazing years until I closed my last physical shop this past November.
Read MoreIn High Falls and other small towns of America, unlike the villages and cities of Europe, Latin America and elsewhere whose thoughtful and visionary urban planners integrated the town square or piazza as an essential priority for the health of a community and individuals, most Americans must make due with stores and restaurants, the workplace and places of activities like gyms and studios to gather, exchange wares and stories, validate one another, see and be seen.
Read MoreEnthusiastic, accessible, and deeply committed to what they are growing, the owners of Meso have elevated crafts to mainstream design with a conscience, and they have a lot to be proud of.
Read MoreMeet Zofia Wolicki, Director of Sales and Marketing for one of Nectar's favorite small businesses: Hand in Hand.
Read MoreThis is the story of a furniture and gift shop owner who lost her way. “Focus on the beauty,” my Indian mother Kumi says, ever evolved. She does not mean this in a superficial way, as in beauty of the body, she could give a rat's ass about that.
Read MoreThe summer months are hectic and as wonderful as it is to get outside and spend time with friends and family, it’s also important that we find moments to recharge.
Read MoreYva Momatiuk and John Eastcott's exquisite photo series of clouds plucked across the wide world once graced the walls of my Rhinebeck shop.
Read More…it wasn’t ordinary at all, this inherently elegant thing. It was something much more: a cord that connected them before me in an overt way and to the women they secretly carried within them. Then the daughter turned her wrist over in a careless motion to indicate the way it was bound…
Read MoreThe joyous, open-hearted man in this photo worked in a gorgeous antique shop in a town on our way back to Marrakech, Morocco where I went in 2015.
Read MoreI just returned a week ago from a pokey little town on the Pacific side of Costa Rica. The adjustment has been difficult, honestly. I seem to have left one foot in the wet sand, still searching for the sun.
Read MoreWhile in a foreign country, an ear for language and bartering abilities are only part of the picture when it comes to making connections.
Read MoreSomewhere in Rajasthan, India, we trudged for days through factory buildings and across open lots to look at myriad furniture, knick-knacks, architectural items, and antiques.
Read MoreEach morning, as my mother does, as her mother did before us, I put away the dishes. I rise early to relish in the rapture of a quiet house before the raucous of the day begins. Whether the children, the husband, or the guests are sleeping or I am alone in my house, the ritual is the same. This is my morning meditation.
Read MoreThere is the anticipation of travel before the trip begins: the excitement and fear about what will be different, what will change within me, and how I might possibly impact the new place.
Read MoreI had a simple vision for our newest window display at Nectar for 2014; quince clipped from my snow-covered garden, their spindly, stark branches to be placed in a large vase on a beautiful hand-made dining table.
Read MoreAt only 9:30a.m., a half an hour before I officially opened the store, a sporty silver 4 x 4 pulled up. Whoever it was sat in the car a few extra minutes and I used the time to continue with the morning’s tasks.
Read MoreI wanted to write about how incredibly grateful I am to be raising my baby and older sons in a community where mothering is respected and supported.
Read MoreThe sun has risen over the equator and fleets of overburdened ancient trucks, some literally toppled over on the highway by the weight of their unwieldy loads.
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