Somethings old, somethings new

[attach]5308[/attach]Diana Ross has called Bloor West Village home her entire life.

Therefore, she says, it was fitting to open her business in the neighbourhood as well.

“I was born and raised here,” she said. “It just made sense to me because I’m known here in the area. I’ve always worked in the area and this building came on the market and I watched it for a few months actually and then just decided one day I have to go and see it and that was it.”

Nestled on the corner of Annette Street and Beresford Avenue, A Changing Nest is a specialty décor, furniture and consignment shop with pieces dating back a century.

“The store is an eclectic mix of home décor,” Ross says. “I really span 100 years so again you’ll see something that’s 100 years old and then you’ll see something that’s a piece of today and everything in between.”

She says she loves to mix styles together and picks items she can easily envision in someone’s home as well as pieces that are unique and serve a purpose.

“I love things with some history that have had a past life and bring it all together in a home environment so people can get a real feel walking through the store how things work together and how things work in their home.”

Ross came up with the idea for the store after thinking about how she wanted to end her working career since her role as mom changed now that her daughters are in their mid-20s.

“I looked at what’s my love, what’s my passion and made the decision to try it,” she says. “I don’t want to look back and say I should have, I wanted to so I just thought let’s do it.”

Having previously renovated and fixed up several homes she says she wanted to take her love for interior design and gardening to the next level. Since opening the shop on Oct. 29, she says she’s felt very welcomed by the community, whether they’ve told her they appreciate a new store that isn’t a chain or said they wanted to spend hours in the shop cozying up to the fire.

“I’m finding with the older vintage pieces, it brings back memories for people, you’ll hear people say, ‘Oh my goodness, my grandmother served us sandwiches on plates like that’ or ‘My grandmother had a lamp like that, oh I remember that,’ ” she says. “So it just evokes some really nice pleasant memories.”

As for the name, Ross chose it because it captured the essence of an ever-changing nest as people’s homes continuously change as they go through life based on factors like family and evolving taste.

“I think people love the idea that we are recycling, we are reusing, we are repurposing things that had a life and now we can find a new life for certain things,” she says. “We’ve gone through such a period of waste and waste and everything’s disposable, well these things that are coming in here have had a long life and still have a long one to go.”