About
My grandmother always found beauty in simple things. A bolt of crisp linen. A bird bath. Pearls. Her name was Emily Joubert. My shop is a tribute to her and her belief in me.
Maybe I was destined to own a shop like this. I have always loved to collect and sell. When I was six, my mother ran to the grocery store only to come home to find me with her bridge table set up at the end of the driveway. On it were china and crystal from the cupboard, and a few strands of pearls from her jewelry box. “For Sale,” I had scrawled on a piece of paper.
In my 20s, after attending design school, I traveled the country selling shoes to department stores for Esprit de Corps, then Ralph Lauren. I soaked up the fashion and style around me and honed my own. I met my husband, Mike, at Esprit and our life of adventure began. We moved to southern Hungary where he helped start a textile and apparel mill. With my toddler son in arms, I scoured the countryside for antiques – for crystal doorknobs, antique pottery, Biedermeier dressers. Though we arrived in Budapest with four dufflebags, we returned home with a 40-foot container.
We settled in Woodside, into a charming cottage where I still cherish my grandmother’s clean-lined sofa, which I slipcovered in crisp linen. My husband raises bees in the back yard that pollinate our fruit trees and vegetable garden. Our two boys sell jars of honey from a stand at the end of our driveway
At home and in the store, I’ve tried to surround my life with simple, beautiful things. I think my grandmother would have been proud. At my shop that bears her name, I keep her portrait on the wall.