| About Us |
 The Beadster grew out of a long love affair with tiny objects of desire, and the acquisition of a warehouse selling African artefacts with room for some small boxes of beads. Believing we were too far flung in the wilds of North Dorset, we didn’t really expect a dusty barn to be the most obvious place to start a bead shop. However, six months and many hundreds of beads later, the philosophy of high quality low price, proved to be very popular.In early autumn 2007 a friend told us that a tiny shop, The Sun and Moon Cottage at the top of historic Gold Hill in Shaftesbury was available to rent, but we immediately dismissed it as far too small – how on earth could you fit two thousand square feet into just a few hundred? However some weeks later, having lunch at the restaurant next door to the tiny shop, we began to wonder if we had been a little hasty. Peering between the tissue papered windows of the vacant shop, which had originally been two tiny cottages, we saw the potential to showcase Africa indoors, and provide a base for The Beadster. True to form, the deal to lease the shop was struck in a matter of days (in the fastest time ever according to the Elder of our leasing agent, including obtaining a reference from Zimbabwe) and on 10th November 2007 we opened the doors of the Sun and Moon Cottage, Africa Indoors and The Beadster had arrived in Shaftesbury. A year later and we were on the move again! This time it was to move the contents of our Sturminster Newton warehouse to a new unit at Semley Business Park, a few miles north of Shaftesbury. This is giving us the opportunity of re-arranging the layout of the warehouse, enabling us to display both the bead stocks and the Africa Indoors stocks to better effect. The move has been made, and we are open for business, although it will take several months to get really settled. |
