Modern General Brings Etsy to Downtown Fredericton
FREDERICTON–Melissa Howard started out in a place very different from the clean, modern shop space she now has on York Street in downtown Fredericton. An electrical engineer by trade, she’s ditched oil fields for handmade arts and goods she collects from makers online and displays meticulously in her new store Modern General.
We stopped by Howard’s place to ask her how it’s been going.
What led you to open this space?
I have a random background. I was an electrical engineer and I went and worked in Alaska and Texas and Calgary in the oil fields and then in 2009 I quit engineering altogether. I had a 30’s breakdown and I went to yoga teacher training. I went from engineer nerd to yoga. That led me to nutrition.
All through that I started to develop passions for knitting and making my own clothes, which I had never even done at all. That led me to start appreciating things that people make, who have true passion for what they do. I believe every object holds the energy of the maker a little bit. It morphed over time. I just decided in February of this year I was really bored and I was a stay-at-home mom and I said “I might as well just see if this will work” and it all came together.
Did you have an inspiration for what you wanted to feature here?
I love Etsy and Instagram and I was following a lot of cool people doing stuff locally in Canada in the States and there was no real place to get that here in Fredericton. So you can come in and see products and touch and feel and smell.
We’re all going to buy online now because we don’t have the access to stores that you do in bigger cities here in Fredericton. People are shopping online a lot and I wanted to bring back the community feel of coming downtown and picking up something cute.
Who are you trying to appeal to?
Me. It’s really just things that I love. I go with what I love and hope other people love it.
What’s your process for choosing what goes into your store?
I look at packaging. I’m really a stickler for packaging and a lot of the items in here I’ve tried myself. It was a little scary when I opened just two and a half weeks ago, seeing if people were going to love what I love but I’ve had really positive feedback so I just go with my gut.
Any hopes for the store?
I hope people love it. I hope to do workshops in here and show people how to make macrame hangers and maybe some wreaths for Christmas and maybe some candles, really show people they can make this stuff too. I’m so new I haven’t had time to think about the future. I don’t think there’s anything like this here and I’m excited.