Window Shopping

Go West

By Shelley Mann

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WILL SHILLING PHOTO

Walking into the new West Elm at Easton Town Center, the first thing you'll notice is the how colorful everything is.

The front of the modern home furnishings store is full of bright, lemon-yellow throw pillows and seaside-inspired blue glass vases. They're colors you'll also see down the way at Easton's trendy fashion boutiques.

"We're a very fashion-oriented business," said Bradley Odom, West Elm regional manager. "The biggest color in fashion for summer is yellow, so not only do you find it in the fashion world, now you can find it in the design world."

WILL SHILLING PHOTO

Their store philosophy is similar to the fashion world's, too. West Elm sells well-made "basics" — like sofas, dining tables and dinnerware — in neutral colors, then offers well-priced accessories that can be changed seasonally to reflect the newest trends or changing personal tastes.

Their extremely popular throw pillows are a perfect example, Odom said. Pillow covers are sold separately from the pillow inserts, so "you can come back and pick a new cover and have a whole new look," he said.

The Easton store opened on Wednesday, and is the chain's first Columbus location. Odom called the average West Elm customer "savvy, educated and design-oriented. It's a person who likes high-end design at an affordable price."

WILL SHILLING PHOTO

A lot of the furniture designs are tailored to urban, small-space living, like low-slung leather sectionals and the Tillary, a neat modular piece that can transform from a chaise to an armless sofa to a single bed.

The retailer built its reputation by sticking with its most successful items — streamlined couches from the Walton collection, headboards and chairs in an iconic "overlapping square" pattern — and continuing to evolve them with updated colors and fabrics.

Odom bragged about the store's approachable and well-trained staff members, who can offer room-planning advice with the help of software at the store's design kiosks. Customers can bring in room measurements, or staff members can download apartment and house floor plans, then show how West Elm furniture would best fit in the space.

You won't find clearance sections at West Elm, and the chain typically holds just two sales a year (at the end of summer and at the end of the year). Even though the colors and designs are always changing, the stock is closely monitored and most lines eventually sell out.

"We feel like because we're affordable, we don't need to be promotional," Odom said. "We tell people, 'Get it while you can.'"

April 17, 2008

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