Island Girl

Jewelry Boutique — another new shop in Boothbay Harbor
Wed, 07/20/2016 - 1:15pm

Story Location:
41 Commercial Street
Boothbay Harbor, ME 04575
United States

There's another exciting new shop in Boothbay Harbor.

Jewelry Boutique, in the space that was Gold/Smith Gallery for many years, is full to the brim with  fashions and jewelry. If you're looking for humdrum everyday clothes, don't look here.

Proprietor Chelsea Combrink is a designer of some hip, chic, cool tops and dresses. She's the daughter of Brenda Lee and Chris Combrink, who recently opened their own shop, Finest Kind, also in Boothbay Harbor.

Combrink, who grew up in Boca Grande, Florida, earned a merchandising degree from the The Art Institute in Ft. Lauderdale two years ago. She met fashion designer Roberta Hurlburt, who holds a degree in fine arts from Boston University and is the founder of Drift On Island, last year. Hurlburt immediately hired her and the two began collaborating on their fashion ideas and business sense. They now have a studio in Cape Cod and their designs are carried in two small boutiques in Sarasota and Boca Grande, Florida. The Boothbay Harbor location is their first shop.

Along with designing fashions, Combrink oversees the business end of the company — marketing, social media, and meetings with manufacturers. She also designed the Drift On Island website. “I'm pretty much all over the place,” she said with a laugh.

Combrink, who has the look of a professional model, also does much of the company's modeling.

Inspired by the beaches in Florida where she grew up, many of Combrink's designs are made with colorful strips of fabrics woven through fishnet. Last September she took second place in the Harbor Fest Fishin' for Fashion show.

Combrink's proud mother, Brenda Lee, who was in the shop on July 18, said her daughter inherited her knack for sewing from her grandmother, Helen Beardsley, who's 88 and still making wedding dresses. “I'm the youngest of nine,” Brenda Lee said. “She made my and all of my sisters' wedding dresses.” Combrick's father, Chris, also sews. “We all can sew,” Brenda Lee said. “Whether we want to sew is the question.”

Right now, all of Combrink's designs in the Boothbay Harbor boutique are couture — handmade, individually, one at a time. No two are alike. You could say each garment is a work of art. It takes three days to make some of the dresses.

Their first “batch” of samples is being manufactured now and will be delivered in August, with sizes ranging from small to large. “Those pieces will be a little more tailored,” Combrink said. “We make a prototype and send it off to our manufacturer.”

Aside from Combrink's designs made with strips of fabric woven through fishnet, there are some pieces made with vintage English lace, chiffon scarves and crocheted items. There are also some skirts and tops made with men's neckties.

And if you don't fall in love with one of Combrink's creations, the shop is full of her mother's line of clothing — vintage and new designer samples — too. And, as the name of the shop implies, the boutique carries jewelry — vintage, estate and new pieces comprised of old pieces — enough to dazzle the mind for hours on end.

Some of the jewelry was made by three women Brenda Lee met in Texas, during her times on the road with her four kids, dog and cat to exhibit and promote antique, trade and trunk shows. “We met a lot of different designers along the way, which is probably where Chelsea got inspired growing up.”

Combrink said she plans to have the new manufactured items, along with her couture pieces, in the boutique during the 2016 Fishin' for Fashion Show.

Drift On Island's fashions can be seen on its website, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest and Facebook.

Prices for the couture pieces range from around $145 to $400.

Jewelry Boutique is located at 41 Commercial Street in Boothbay Harbor.