Twigs and Twine owner Jill Roberts knows a thing or two about transformation. She started her midcentury-modern furniture and décor store as a modest side hustle and creative outlet. She began by painting and selling furniture on Craigslist, eventually renting a booth at now-defunct Phoenix antique retailer Qcumberz before opening her first storefront in the Melrose District in 2010. Several expansions and a disastrous electrical fire later, Roberts is celebrating three years at her Arcadia location this October.
The store specializes in wooden furniture (twigs) and home accents (twine) sourced from estate sales and other vintage vendors around the Valley. She will also custom-paint dressers, desks, coffee tables, nightstands, bookshelves and buffets. “When people come in for the first time, open the door and say, ‘Oh my gosh, I love everything in here,’ it just makes my heart happy that people are finding stuff that they love,” Roberts says. “It never gets old.” She is also intentional about ensuring that the small store’s layout is “curated, not cluttered… a cohesive little nook that has different textures and colors that go together.”
Another sentiment she never tires of hearing is when customers tell her that a piece of furniture brings back memories of their grandparents’ house or childhood home. “We really do care about the stories that you want to tell us about your house and decorating and your baby’s room,” she says. “Most of the furniture comes from… the end of somebody’s life, and it’s the start of somebody else’s… I love that it can start a whole new life again.”
