At the end of July, Nova and Me packed away their third pop up display with us! They’ve been coming back in Ashbourne to takeover our shop window display every year since 2022. Each year their display gets even bigger and better than the last!
This year I’ve been really focused on pop ups and have been trying to host as many pop up displays in our shop window – they’re an incredible way for us to work with talented local artists, illustrators and makers. Our pop up displays give other creative small businesses an opportunity to show their work to a totally new audience and reach lots of new customers.
The pop up displays have been working amazingly well so far and we’ve had so much interest from small businesses wanting to takeover shop window. Each one is only run for a very limited time – we usually aim to have them in-situ for between two and three weeks. Timing is absolutely key when planning the pop ups as I like to have a smooth transition from one to another so it takes a bit of juggling sometimes!
I’m absolutely loving having so many pop up displays in this year – it’s a great way way for me to trial creations from new and existing artisans to see what our customers think and love, and if they’re something we’d want to stock in the shop moving forward.
So who are Nova and Me and what do they create?
So if you’ve not come across Nova and Me Illustrations yet, they’re a small business ran by the incredibly talented Lauren (with the help and support of her husband Phill). They live over in Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire so they’re only about 30-40 minutes away from our shop in Ashbourne. I’ve known them both for about three years now I think and they really are the most lovely couple you’ll ever meet!
Lauren is the creative force behind Nova and Me, she designs, draws and paints absolutely everything. She is obsessed with bright colours and anything with a smiley face – you’ll see how obvious this is later on when I show you some of her latest designs! A lot of her artwork also features cute animals and pretty rainbows so you can expect to see lots of those soon too.
Lauren has all her colourful, cheery artwork printed right here in the UK – she has her designs printed onto lots of different products so we had something for everyone. We had a huge selection of A4 wall art prints, mini prints and greeting cards to choose from as well as notepads, bookmarks and hand painted wooden shapes.
Lauren made a lovely mixture of different wooden shapes: clouds, earth, flowers, hearts, mountains and stars. They are all cut out of MDF and then individually hand painted by Lauren – complete with a little smiley face of course! After she’s finished painting them, they are sprayed with a layer of varnish and a sawtooth picture hook is added to the back. That way you have the option to either hang it up on the wall or place on a shelf.
Here’s a quick video of Lauren from Nova and Me creating one of the unique wooden flowers:
What did Nova and Me’s window display look like?
This was Nova and Me’s third time taking over our shop window display. After a really successful first year back in 2022, Lauren and Phill wanted a crack at the large shop window display and in my usual laid back attitude I said “why not, lets do it!”. After seeing how amazing their display in the small window was, I knew they’d come up with something incredible – and I was right.
I always give Nova and Me creative license to do what they want with the space so they can really showcase their colourful brand and quirky designs. This years display was by far the best yet… they used three huge wooden boxes as the foundation of their display and wrapped a ginormous, colourful banner across the front of them. It had their Nova and Me logo in the middle with lots of quirky illustrations around it – it was an absolute showstopper. They then added a chipboard top to contrast against the vibrant colours of the crates and artwork.
As always, Phill came armed with power tools ready to cut everything to size to make sure it all fitted in the window perfectly. They even brought their own dust pan and brush to clean up after themselves – see what I mean about them both being so blooming lovely! Amber was a little dubious about the power tools but Orla was weirdly drawn to them – she actually climbed on top of the chipboard sheet as Phill was trying to cut it to shape!
So what were Nova and Me’s best sellers during the pop up?
Over the three weeks, Nova and Me’s notepads were by far the most popular purchase with our customers. They actually all sold out about two weeks into the pop up display! The cute notepads were something that Lauren had only recently designed so it was the first time I’d actually seen them in the flesh. There were three quirky designs to choose from: I Love A List, What’s Cooking Meal Planner and It’s a Plan Daily Planner. Notepads aren’t really something we’ve sold in the shop before, other than the occasional seasonal design for autumn or spring. After seeing how much our customers love stationary and notebooks – it’s definitely something I’ll be looking more into and hopefully look at growing our range of notebooks. I’m sure it’ll probably come as no surprise that we will now be stocking Nova and Me’s notepads in the shop for the foreseeable future. I hate to say it in August but they’re going to make amazing stocking fillers at Christmas!
Picking a second place is really tricky, we sold absolutely loads of lovely greeting cards, wall art prints and bookmarks. There wasn’t a particular design that stood out as being the favourite, they all sold equally as well. We will be looking to add Nova and Me’s bookmarks to the shop over the coming months as well as expanding on the number of her greeting cards and a4 prints too.
We have stocked an ever growing range of Nova & Me’s wall art prints for a few years now and they continue to be popular. Lauren doesn’t include any of the designs we usually stock in her pop up display to make sure everything she’s showing to our customers is brand new.
Her Life is Amazing Print which features the most beautiful poem by L.R.Knost about the highs and lows of life surrounded by a pretty illustration of wildflowers always flies out – especially if I pop it in the shop window! We’ve sold this wall art print for quite a while now and everyone loves it – it’s exactly what you need to read if you’re going through a tough time as a reminder that things do get better and life is a constant rollercoaster. I always pop this inspirational print in the window in January, with that being the most depressing time of year, in the hope that it cheers up people as they’re passing by our shop.
Lauren has her own dedicated page in our Maker Directory, If you’d like to get to know more about her and her small business, I’ve spent a little bit of time conducting a short interview with her. You can have a nosey and read more by clicking here.
Are you interested in having a pop up display with us?
Like I said earlier on, we have been successfully hosting pop up displays with local small businesses in our shop windows for the last three years now. They’ve always been incredibly popular and the feedback from our lovely customers and makers has always been amazing. It’s not everyday a small business is given the opportunity to takeover a shop window on a busy high street smack bang in a town centre!
Not only are pop up shop window displays a great way for us trial lots of new products from new and existing makers for a short period of time, they are also a great way for creative small businesses to get their products in front of a totally new audience. We’re fully booked for pop up shop displays for this year now and have already starting booking them in for next year. If you think you might be interesting in having a pop up display with us in the future, I am always keen to hear from local artists and makers. I absolutely love partnering with other small businesses and being able to showcasing their work in our shop windows. If you’re interested in finding out more about how it all works and to discuss availability for next year, please send me an email (Laura) on [email protected] with the subject line POP UP ENQUIRY and I will get back to you as soon as I can.
