Asheville's East Fork Pottery Opens in Atlanta
Scroll through East Fork pottery's playful Instagram account and one thing will quickly become apparent: The Asheville, North Carolina–based company has built up a loyal following. Each day, hundreds of the social media platform's users drop by its page to express their love for East Fork's minimalist dinnerware pieces, share styling tips, and inquire about product availability. Now, a growing number of East Fork customers in the Southeast, including members of the design trade, can enjoy that experience in real time—and in person—thanks to the recent opening of the company's first brick-and-mortar store outside Asheville, in Atlanta's quickly growing Westside Provisions District, home to hip retailers like Sid and Ann Mashburn, Hudson Grace, and the Savannah Bee Company.
As in its Asheville store and on its website, East Fork's Atlanta inventory includes the company's popular dinner plates, serving bowls, mugs, vases, and more in five signature earth tones, as well as items designed and made by regional artisans. Special seasonal colors will be introduced each April and September, and occasional limited-release colors will be rolled out in the store as well. All East Fork ceramics are made in the brand's new 14,500-square-foot manufacturing facility, located in Asheville's Biltmore Village, where cofounder Connie Matisse says tours will be offered beginning as early as February.
In keeping with East Fork's elegantly easy aesthetic, the new 1,700-square-foot store is a welcoming, airy, light-filled space where patrons are encouraged to arrange and rearrange dinnerware sets and tabletop accessories to help visualize how they might look in their own homes. Though much of the stores' inventory is fragile, Matisse, who cofounded East Fork in 2009 with her husband, Alex (the great-grandson of artist Henri Matisse), and potter John Vigeland, doesn't want patrons to be timid about touching it. "We have no interest in making a store that feels like a museum," she says, adding that "overflowing stacks of pottery" invite patrons to "come in and play around."
Also invited to come in are Atlanta-based interior designers, who, after registering in-store or by contacting East Fork online, receive a 20 percent discount when purchasing on behalf of a client. East Fork is eager to work with Atlanta realtors, too, offering agents branded, boxed gift sets to be given as thank-you or housewarming gifts to their home-buying clientele.
When it comes to being a resource for design professionals, East Fork's founders intend for the store to serve not only as a place to shop, but as a place to gather and share ideas. "The one thing that we're really good at is throwing parties, so we have some events in mind specifically for the industry to come and just do a little cross-pollinating and introduce ourselves and the line and make sure everyone knows each other," Connie says. "We really like the idea of East Fork just doing the legwork of getting people who have similar interests into a room together and seeing if they can build relationships in a way that feels less conference-like and is outside of the typical workplace. It gives people an excuse to share stories, especially for people in the trade to talk about client experiences and share resources."
Matisse says that the store will also play host to events geared toward everyday consumers, with possibilities ranging from table-setting and flower-arranging workshops to trunk shows and cooking demos. What won't be offered are pottery workshops. "Our feeling behind that is that our approach to making pottery is not really something you can learn in a day or an afternoon, and there are a lot of pottery classes you can take elsewhere," Connie says. Just as well—that leaves all the more time for shopping.
East Fork is now open at 1170 Howell Mill Road, Suite P12B
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