Abigail Hebert

The Mix, an art supplies store previously located on Maine Street, is moving to 163 Park Row and is set to reopen on February 1. The shop, which opened eight years ago as a small store featuring art supplies and colorful gifts, started with a haircut. Leslie Beattie, one of The Mix’s owners, bought the space from her hairdresser when the salon moved to the hairdresser’s house.

“She said, ‘I don’t know if anyone would want to buy it,’” Beattie said. “And I said, ‘I’ll buy it.’ And so I tell people I bought the store over a haircut.”

The Mix has been a longtime dream for Beattie, having first appeared as an idea in her journal ten years prior to its opening, under the title “What do you want?”

“I knew I had to sell something other than art supplies. It’s been very interesting to see [the shift that happened]. It used to be mostly gifts that I would sell, and now it’s mostly art supplies,” Beattie said. “There’s a vibrant arts community in this area, and I feel it’s getting people to think about, ‘Okay, why don’t we have a Brunswick arts community?’”

Beattie’s purchase of the Park Row property was motivated by a mix of reasons: to find a better space for the store itself—the current Maine Street building’s shape is nonoptimal—and to provide a walkable residence for her family.

“I figured if I could find a place in town that could house the store and my kids, then that would be the best of both worlds. One of my kids probably won’t ever drive, so living in town is pretty crucial, because living where we live out in Topsham is really rural and isolating,” Beattie said. “I bought the building mostly for my family—for the business and for my family.”

The renovation of the Park Row location, which housed accountants for the past 50 years, has been large-scale, involving taking down the wallpaper, pulling up the carpet and painting the walls. Community volunteers—from kids to older people—have been a great help in this process.

“People were coming in asking how they could help, and I knew right away that I couldn’t keep it all in my brain, so I decided to do a SignUpGenius,” Beattie said. “I couldn’t believe the outpouring of support…. It was people who weren’t necessarily my closest friends or customers; it was just people that really love a sense of community…. And there have been different people at every step of the way. The people that pulled up the carpet aren’t the same people that painted, and it’s been really cool.”

The Mix has been an active part of the growing vibrance of the Brunswick arts community.

“It’s prophetic in a really weird sense, because [my journal entry] talked about wanting to have a store where I sold things that I liked to use and that was a community hub for people—a safe place for people to come and learn about creating,” Beattie said.

Looking to the future, Beattie urged the creation of a structured arts organization in Brunswick. Beattie expects that the new store location will create better accessibility to The Mix, as well as more opportunities for local artists to engage with the community and each other. With its new location across from the town mall and Brunswick Farmers Market, Beattie hopes the new space will be more inviting to the public.

“I have a beautiful lawn, and so … in June, it’ll be so nice to have little tables and chairs outside that people can sit and draw in,” Beattie said. “And I have a maker space in the back, so I’m hoping to have classes and other community events to make it a little bit more community focused.”