By Dominique Tassell
When Colleen Gillece and her husband bought their new house in Warwick after moving from Goondiwindi, the little shop at the front of the property was originally intended for storage.
“Well we didn’t buy the house for the shop, but then we said we could paint it and do it up,” she says.
“It was the store room, everything was already in here!”
Thus, the Little Shop at 23 was born.
Colleen is a self-proclaimed “lover of pretty things”, and she loves sharing her pretty things with others.
“I’ve been collecting for probably most of my life, but just lately probably the last 10, 15 years I’ve collected most of the things in the shop.”
In the Little Shop, Colleen combines preloved goods with new things she’s made.
Offerings that Colleen has reworked include everything from embroidered hand towels and homemade pincushions to candleholders made out of sprockets.
“I call it recycle, reinvent, renew” Colleen says, pointing to a skirt she remade into two aprons.
“I like to reuse things and give them another life.”
Colleen also loves scrapbooking and card making, and sells the things she makes in store.
She also wants to hold workshops in the future on these crafts.
“A lot of people think you need talent to do scrapbooking, but anyone can do it.”
When it comes to the secondhand homewares in the store, Colleen says she’s been building her collection for years.
“I’m a big collector of coffee china and glass ware.”
Colleen says her store is a curated shop, and that’s what sets it apart from other secondhand stores.
“The shop is affordable.”
“I think the dearest thing in the shop is $20.”
“It’s only a little shop, I haven’t got a lot of room. So that’s the namesake, I kept referring to it as the little shop. So I had to keep calling it that.”
The store is located on the corner of Lyons and Percy Street at number 23, and you can find the shop on Facebook at www.facebook.com/Little-Shop-at-23-101460878852483
