Walk inside The Carmody marketplace in the historic Coronado neighborhood and you’ll find Wicker Goddess – a homey vintage shop selling curated wicker furniture, clothing, artwork, housewares and small maker goods. It all began with preparations for owner Sarah Small’s 2018 Phoenix wedding. “I had this vision for this bohemian, dreamy, vintage vibe wedding,” she says. Small and her husband enjoy thrifting and spent a year collecting vintage goblets, chairs, rugs, tables and glassware for the décor on their special day. The shop’s name comes from a moniker Small’s husband gave her, as he saw her repeatedly drawn to all things wicker. After the wedding, Small wondered, “What am I going to do with all this stuff?”
She realized that just as she was seeking vintage furniture, others must be, too. Small started posting items on Instagram in 2019. “It blew up on accident!” A serendipitous conversation months later between a customer and a common friend – “just kismet,” she says – led to Small opening her brick-and-mortar location in February 2021. Her shop attracts diverse customers, from younger folks “shifting into a more intentional home, a space where you’re curating things” to older shoppers who are satisfying their nostalgia – they remember having the glassware or hutch when they were younger and “they want to have it again.”
WICKER GODDESS
1710 N. 16th St., Phoenix
480-999-6048, wickergoddess.com
