Never out of style
Photo: Contributed
Katrina and Shawn Hansen do not blend in.
Standing on the floor Pinned – their rockabilly-inspired, downtown Kelowna boutique – they look like a pair of stylish 50s-era misfits.
Shawn, grinning from behind a long beard, sports Dickies, held up by suspenders, over a graphic tee.
Katrina wears a red polka-dot dress, flared at the waist, and a tiny black cardigan. Her lips are bright red and her bangs swoop back atop her head.
Her eyes crease at the corners as she glides through the store showing off their products: 50s-style dresses, skull-print fabrics and Star Wars wallets.
She seems to fit naturally into the space, but that wouldn’t always have been true. In fact, for a long time she dressed like what she called a “typical Kelowna girl.”
“I wore, like most stay-at-home moms, Lululemons and a hoodie for many, many years,” she says with a lighthearted roll of her eyes.
Her unexpected transformation happened one day in Calgary, when her daughter told her to try on a vintage-style dress.
“I thought ‘everyone else can wear that but not me,’ and then I tried that dress on and I started to cry,” she says, letting out a hearty laugh.
“I felt so pretty, and I was like, O.K., that’s why those starlets back in the day wore this stuff, because you look and feel amazing.”
According to Shawn, that day they left Calgary with $1,500 worth of new wardrobe. As they rumbled home in their jam-packed car, the seed of their new business had already been planted.
Photo: Trevor Nichols
After a few years of keeping their potential business on the back burner they finally took the plunge after Shawn lost his oil industry job.
Pinned started its life as a pop-up shop at Kelowna’s Canada Day celebration.
After about six months of selling at concerts and events across the province they had built up enough capital to take it all the way, and on Dec. 15 they officially opened their Water Street location.
Now, the pair get to watch their customers go through the same moments of revelation they had when they first encountered rockabilly style.
Katrina says of her favorite things is watching people walk out of the change room with a look of joy on their face. She talks about how finding her new style completely changed her perspective.
No longer wrapped in on herself in a hoodie and UGGs, she walked with her shoulders back and a smile on her face. People, she said, acted differently towards her.
“People were way friendlier to me, and it must have been how I felt about myself. I felt pretty good about myself, I had a smile on my face, and people noticed that.”
Katrina and Shawn say they want to bring that same feeling to their customers in Kelowna. A place, Katrina says, that tends to be slightly less receptive to bold style statements.
“There’s a lot of people I think haven’t found a store here that carries what they would like to express their personality,” Katrina says. “I guess I’m trying to get everyone out of their sweats.”
“Lululemon pants and tights aren’t for everyone,” Shawn chimes in with a beaming grin.
For more information on Pinned visit their website.
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