Matthew Ames Opens Walker Street Market in the Berkshires

Berkshires woodworker Lily Thorne crafted the peg rail in Walker Street Market that displays items such as flower baskets, brooms, and wool blankets from California-based weaver Marina Contro.

Ames perches on a bench crafted by Vermont’s Sawyer Made.

hop owner Matthew Ames calls this nook “the pantry;” it’s where he displays tableware handmade by Simone Bodmer-Turner and a statement-making pendant from Studio Ford.

A teapot from Japanese potter Akira Satake symbolizes Ames’s ethos of slowing down.

Walker Street Market is housed in a building that was originally constructed as a general store in 1906.

A sculptural Simone Bodmer-Turner chair makes for a surprising companion to a nineteenth-century painter’s ladder and shop table.

Matthew Ames strongly believes people spend differently depending on a shop’s location. When they’re on vacation, for instance, they have more time to slow down and lean into the experience—the absolute opposite of running into a store on your way home from work on a Tuesday. That’s why, when it came time to realize his lifelong dream of opening a storefront, he was drawn to the Berkshires.

“When I lived in New York, I would visit the Berkshires,” explains the former fashion designer and gallerist. “I always felt a connection to the area’s natural surroundings and its history of supporting arts and crafts.”

In July, Ames opened Walker Street Market in Lenox. More of an art gallery than a market, the 3,800-square-foot shop is divided into three sections. Two connected areas showcase handcrafted furniture, lighting, baskets, and ceramics. A third space, accessible through its own streetside entrance, hosts rotating art exhibits.

The layout encourages shoppers to consider how they are living with objects in their home, be it a broom or a chair. It’s an eclectic mix of styles, yet the thread of craftsmanship runs through everything. “Each artist has their own voice and aesthetic, their own unique point of view,” says Ames.

For fashionistas familiar with Ames’s eponymous label from the early aughts, his emphasis on material, technique, and timelessness should ring a bell. The Art Institute of Chicago graduate stepped away from fashion design after less than ten years, discouraged by the pace of it all.

Lenox, though, has been a very good fit for Ames. Open year round, Walker Street hosts workshops and artist talks and provides Ames with a venue for communicating what he values. “We live in a world where the focus is speed, but often those results aren’t long-lasting,” he says. “I want people to surround themselves with things that are made by hand, that celebrate slowing down.”

Walker Street Market, Lenox, Mass., walkerstreetmarket.com