Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 3/4/2014 (2563 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Let’s skip the April showers and dive right into May flowers a few weeks early.
A new floral shop called Flowers in Bloom opened up in the West End on March 30. The shop, located at 611 Ellice Ave., is headed up by West End resident Angela Hyland, who lives right around the corner, which she considers a bonus for three reasons: she doesn’t have the burden of a long commute to work, she can set her own hours, and she gets to be close to her father.
CINDY CHAN
Angela Hyland has opened up a new floral shop, called Flowers in Bloom, at 611 Ellice Ave.
Hyland grew up in Winnipeg but moved to Toronto later in life. When her father, now 84, suffered a heart attack, Hyland moved back to Winnipeg to take care of him.
"I need to be close to him at all times. I’ll go home for lunch or I’ll bring him over here. It’s all about family. I believe in that old-school way, that you take care of your seniors rather than putting them in a home," Hyland said.
Hyland said she had always wanted to run her own business, and a floral shop is the perfect business for her because it incorporates all of her skill sets.
"I have a finance background going back 30 years. I have gardening experience, I have sewing experience," Hyland said, adding that she also prints her own business cards and plans to add slippers to her business.
Hyland has been gardening since she was 11. She’d always done it as a hobby and never considered it as a profession until an opportunity to do so presented itself.
Flowers in Bloom is currently occupying the space where Brown Drapes and Upholstery had operated since the 1970s, Hyland said.
"Mr. Brown is an old friend of the family," Hyland explained. "When his wife died, he came over to my house and he was crying so badly. He said, ‘My wife just died,’ and I said ‘Don’t worry about it,’ and I took over at that point.
"He was saying that he was selling the company, but I never thought about it."
Eventually, Hyland consulted her fiancé, Don Mourant, about possibly buying the property.
"He saw the offer being a good one, so he said if I don’t do well with this — which I will — he was just going to flip it. We got it as a private sale, it didn’t go on the market. It was bantering back and forth, and Mr. Brown said, ‘OK, fine,’" Hyland explained.
She has a lot of real estate to work with at the shop, and Hyland said she is going to convert the back part of the lot into an outdoor garden, with a pebble stone walkway and a gazebo, where people can enjoy coffee, tea, and muffins.
"When they go back, they can buy gardening things, like fresh tomatoes — not food, I’m talking for planting," Hyland said. "There could be pumpkins in the fall, Christmas trees in the winter."
Since it’s been a long winter, Hyland said she doesn’t anticipate the outdoor garden coming to fruition until late May.
"I’ve addressed it with a few people and they think it’s a wonderful idea for the downtown. I’ll be the first one doing something like this, and I’m so excited to do it," Hyland said.
Flowers in Bloom is open Tuesday to Saturday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., and is closed on Sunday and Monday.
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