It was 2014 in Brooklyn when Ninze Chen made her first real splurge on a piece of furniture. A pair of dining chairs, to be exact, made by Danish designer Hans Wegner. The lines, simplicity and quality of how well-made they were left her swooning. Chen was a book and graphic designer who had just bought her first place in Ridgewood, Queens and she was searching for interesting pieces to put in her new home. She still remembers the first time she walked into a vintage shop called Other Times in Bushwick and thought to herself, Where did they find all these things? How were they able to do this? In awe and admiration, Chen began talking to the shop owners who shared a website with her for estate sales where they sourced much of their furniture. “It was like discovering a new country,” Chen tells me. “I went down a rabbit hole. [Each piece] has a rich history. There’s so much love, thought, and culture that goes into creating these beautiful, functional objects.”
Chen’s persistent foraging of furniture eventually turned into an Etsy shop alongside her freelance design work. What she couldn’t see clearly in those years was how this new skill she was cultivating had bigger plans for her life; but what she did know was that the unhealthy city lifestyle she’d been immersed in for nine years at that point was beginning to wear her out. After obliging her partner on a few camping trips upstate to break away, she felt a growing urge to shake up her life. Most of the time, that itch to grow is all it takes. She sold her home in Queens and moved to a small town called Livingston Manor, two and a half hours north west of New York City, into a fixer upper she planned to re-design while having the extra space to house the furniture for her Etsy shop. Even amidst a wild leap of faith, design and growth were at the center of it all.
In 2019, Ninze Chen opened Long Weekend, a storefront of vintage furniture and home goods. Her shop is one of a handful of new businesses that have recently popped up in the small town alongside the migration of former citydwellers, breathing new life into the community and attracting a larger influx of weekend tourism. “So many of us moved up here thinking, I’m going to try this out for a few years and see if the lifestyle feels right,” Chen says. The long-term vision for many creative entrepreneurs, as Chen exemplifies, may be less about solidifying a five year plan and more about learning on the fly, and understanding what’s possible.
While living through the pandemic, many folks began leaving the city grind for rural, country life and the radical idea of starting over, or trying something new. Becoming a shop owner in a small town has its charm, and the images flooding social media contribute to the on-brand fantasy of it all, but small town or not, the delusion of working for oneself, let alone operating a storefront, is a hustle much like the city that never sleeps.
Anything and everything about owning a physical storefront goes largely unseen, she tells me. “Maintaining the warehouse of furniture inventory, coordinating repairs and fixes, researching materials for repair, moving pieces around the store for one perfect photo, merchandising, finding new vendors, driving…” Chen sources her goods from all over the northeast and beyond. While the idea of having a flagship store may appear to be a very grounding reality, much of her time is spent driving around to source new pieces for the shop. “My whole life is a road trip,” she jokes. It’s those long drives mid-week that inspire her and end up fueling some of her best ideas.
Nuts and bolts aside, antiquing has its skeptics. “[I think] the assumption is that [these types of] businesses are swimming in cash because we’re putting these margins on vintage, but that’s not the reality,” she tells me. Sure, someone may find something at an antique shop somewhere, Chen explains, but it isn’t as likely as it sounds. Sourcing items, the skill that Chen’s been developing now for nearly a decade, is merely one facet of her profession. “I don’t have a team of people packing and shipping stuff. I don’t have a team of people taking and editing photos. It’s just me.”
One of the trickiest parts in Chen’s journey of operating a storefront business during the pandemic years has been dealing with the rising cost of goods. “It impacted a lot,” Chen says, “it wasn’t just furniture.” Dealing with the curveball in real time meant seeing some unpredictably high highs and low lows in her inconsistent sales, but it also presented her with a unique opportunity to keep learning and cultivating her craft. When it became too difficult or costly to seek out refurbishing for a piece of furniture, Chen – in true entrepreneurial fashion– began to teach herself how to do whatever needed to be done. She can now confidently switch out fabrics, stitch on leather, fill gaps and refinish wood. She now has a separate studio to do it out of it, too – right down the road from her shop.
Having a knack for this kind of thing doesn’t come naturally – it takes time. As Chen points out, “It’s an art, not a science.” And while Chen may not have had any formal training in these areas, it didn’t stop her from trying. When you’re a newbie at anything, Chen says, “you have to know it’s going to take time.” And in that time, Chen has found creative fulfillment in a variety of ways – from designing a tissue paper to reupholstering a chair. But the most rewarding part of her journey so far, has been getting to know her customers. The relationships she’s built have almost inevitably opened up new doorways for growth. “It’s how I began doing interior design for private clients,” Chen says.
Last year, Chen attended a vintage goods show in Texas, and as many new places and experiences have a tendency to do, it ignited another gust of inspiration for her. When it comes to what’s next, Chen dreams of owning the building she operates out of instead of renting it, largely in an effort to diversify her assets. Having the real estate aspect of her own warehouse, studio, and shop feels like the smart next step, she tells me. “Antiques are great, but it’s not going to be the only thing I’m making money from,” she says. Her rental property, Camp Long Weekend, in Parksville is proof of the first step toward exactly that.
Being outside of the city has been a way for Chen to reconnect with her interests and find community. It’s also taught her that even with the stark contrast of living and working in a small seasonal town, you can still suffer from the grind. “It’s good to be evolving and changing and staying open to the next thing,” she says, “but not at the expense of not knowing what’s really happening around you. Not at the expense of not spending time with your family.” She doesn’t know with certainty where the next five years will take her, but she’s able to think about that unknown with excitement, not anxiety. Because for Ninze Chen, it’s not a location, but the answers unknown, that offer her the space to explore what’s possible.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Ashley Rubell is a voracious reader, writer, and hairstylist. Based in the Catskills of upstate New York, Ashley is in the thick of motherhood, raising her two sons while completing her MFA in Nonfiction through Bennington’s Writing Seminars. Her bylines have appeared in Motherly, Write or Die, and Tidal Magazine and she is a regular contributor to Byrdie. She travels around the world styling hair for photoshoots and destination weddings and spends her free time as a submissions reader for Narratively and Epiphany Literary Journal.