Downtown Bellingham

I CHOOSE DOWNTOWN: Ideal 🖼️

For Ideal's owners Lisa and Kathleen, Downtown Bellingham wasn’t just somewhere to open a shop, it was the whole point.

“Downtown is the authentic core of Bellingham. A downtown is the heartbeat of a community and we wanted to be in the center.”

They actually signed the lease for their space six months before they were ready to move in because it was near what they considered one of Downtown’s most important places: Chris Foss’s Greenhouse at the corner of Holly and Cornwall.

Nearly two decades later, Ideal is still a cornerstone of Downtown retail, surrounded by historic architecture, local restaurants, shops, and plenty of people walking the same streets.

For the perfect hour in the shop, take in the color, pattern, and sky blue ceilings, touch and try the beautifully designed objects, doodle with Japanese pencils, flip through a children’s book, and make two laps around the shop so you don’t miss anything.

One of their favorite long-term connections is ReMade, an annual collaboration with WWU’s Industrial Design program. The project began at Ideal in 2008 with students creating products from repurposed materials. One of those students, Justin Lund, is now a WWU Industrial Design professor, and 18 years later he’s leading students through the same project at Ideal.

For Ideal, the best part of being Downtown is that it’s a place for real, in-person connection. After 18 years of being open seven days a week, they still say the best is yet to come!

That’s why they choose Downtown. ❤️

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