Profile: Ampersand Design Studio
The darling duo behind Ampersand Design Studio have opened the doors to their first ever boutique!
Photos by Anna Petrow
We’re checking back in with Morgan Georgie and Carrie Kiefer, the duo behind Ampersand Design Studios– one of our first ever profiles when we launched the site in 2018!
They recently opened up their first ever boutique in Waldo– read on to hear about how being a brick and mortar has inspired changes in their design process, and what we can expect from this darling design studio in the coming year!
What made you pick Waldo?
We've been dreaming of having our very own shop for years!! We envisioned a close knit neighborhood, surrounded by other local, independent shops & restaurants, with lots of walking traffic! When we started searching, Waldo was at the top of our list for all of the above reasons. We truly feel like the location we landed in encompasess everything we had been dreaming about. And we welcome everyone - all the families, and strollers, and dogs of all sizes - we just love finally getting to meet everyone that is visiting our store!
It’s your first time opening up the studio to the public with regular hours- what’s most exciting about this change? Most challenging?
The most exciting thing about this change is something we hadn't quite expected – although we have spaces inside the Made in KC Marketplaces and we have a great shoppable website, we didn't realize how much human interaction we were missing! It wasn't until we opened our doors in Waldo that it dawned on us how rewarding it would be to get to actually see and talk to everyone who visits Ampersand. We've gotten to catch up with so many old friends and connect with new - this is definitely something that doesn't happen when it's an online order. As Francophiles ourselves, we have several art prints and journals with French words and sayings– and just the other day, we had a first grader that attends Academie Lafayette who came in and could read and appreciate all of these pieces, not to mention, interpret them for her parents. Witnessing these little moments are what shop owner dreams are made of!
Another surprise is how insightful our visitors are - now that we are here in person to get to listen to their thoughts and suggestions on what types of products we could carry, exactly what greeting cards they are looking for, and listen to their ideas while they are shopping for gifts for loved ones. It's taking the meaning behind everything we design to the next level, for sure!
With the opening of our own shop, we started to realize that not only can we sell all of our products, we can be a part of supporting other businesses we love. So you will not only find Ampersand goodies in the shop, we are thrilled to announce that we are now carrying arts & crafts products from Omy & Oooly, plush kids toys from Estella, statement earrings from Sunshine Tienda, and more. This has been truly rewarding and we LOVE curating all of our favorite products under one roof!
Do you have any exciting event plans in the new space?
It's funny, but we sort of tip-toed our way into having our own retail space, so we never threw a proper grand opening party - we're dreaming of making that happen still this July!
Also, with expanded studio space and our shop combined in one, we're dreaming up hosting creative workshops here - everything from printmaking for beginners to floral arranging (that one taught by someone else--we just want to learn too!)
You also launched a beautiful wall art collection since we last profiled you on the site. Can you tell us a bit about that?
The wall art collection came to be out of a very selfish need honestly– we were desperate to outfit our own homes with more art! Art that is bold and colorful. Art that makes a statement and speaks to the viewer! We put our heart and soul into the new art collection and made sure it could be customized to any size, frame material and mat. We continue to add in more options as we create them, so it will be an ever-changing collection.
And a little known fact is... most pieces we can actually customize to match any color swatches. We partner with interior designers and clients to get to juuuuust the right shade of any color of their dreams!
Any noticeable patterns or predictions overall in the design world these days? And retail specifically?
The retail world is surprising us. We hadn't guessed that greeting cards would've been one of our top sellers in the shop, but they are! (Yay for all the snail-mail senders, we are in that club still too)
We are also surprised by the fact that the pride in our city isn't dwindling at all. All of our products that have "Kansas City" on them in any capacity are still top-sellers! As Kansas City natives (Morgan from the Missouri-side and Carrie from the Kansas-side), we have to admit that that little fact really makes us smile.
Overall, we are seeing that people really love to support independent and local businesses. Consumers really understand that making a decision where you spend your money makes such a difference for the small business of the world. We want to say THANK YOU to all those that choose to shop this way!
What else are you hoping to achieve alongside all these exciting changes?
Along with having our own logo on a storefront, we hope that our little shop helps to grow our brand recognition in Kansas City and beyond! In addition to making and selling our own product lines, we also license our art to other companies, so we're constantly dreaming up new partnerships. We've partnered with a few favorite local companies for custom collections like Happy Habitat throw blankets, wall art for Golden & Pine, and even outside of Kansas City like packaging for Markham & Fitz chocolatier out of Bentonville, AR and paper party goods for Daydream Society. So, we're always looking for the next dreamy partnership!
