Photo by Matt Rose
“I live in the forest.” So says Ally Mignaud, who, when she’s not in the woods, runs her one-woman business, Belle Decor Designs, out of her West Asheville home. With her partner Jay and daughters Hannah and Olivia, she is outdoors all the time, she says — “we’re either hiking or mountain biking.” And that regular infusion of nature makes its way into her design work.
Mignaud’s Etsy site is lush with the greenery she nestles into the curves of terracotta shingles, or mounts to antique slate shingles that once adorned grand old local homes. While her closest sources of inspiration might be found in Bent Creek or Pisgah National Forest, she remains influenced by her home country, as well. “I’m from Wales, which is kind of like a rainforest, too. It’s very green and very mossy. It’s beautiful. It’s actually a lot like Asheville.” A former employee of Asheville City Schools, Mignaud took a leap two summers ago, leaving the security of a Monday-through-Friday schedule to make home-decor products she believes in.
One day she happened upon some antique shingles. “I picked up a couple and I wondered, ‘What can I do with this?’” Having seen a Staghorn mounted on cedar, she mused about another interpretation. “So I bought some chicken wire and I came up with this.”
She did some research on Staghorns — they’re a type of epiphytic fern that gets moisture from the air and rain — before making her first mounted plant. Once the piece was finished, “I listed it just to see, and now they’re my biggest seller,” says Mignaud, who makes six or seven every day that she’s in her studio.
The ferns fan out and curve upward like the antlers their name invokes, making a tropical tableau that still looks local-mountain rustic. (The designer’s newest venture is wall-mounted orchids.) Known for being hearty as well as striking, Staghorns grow on trees or rocks in the wild, and, over the course of years, can reach epic sizes.
Rather than fastening them permanently to their vertical surfaces, though, Mignaud fashions little wire baskets for her plants. Not only are hers easier to water than other air plants — you simply unhook the plant from the plaque — but this mobile aspect allows her to mount the greenery on almost anything that strikes her fancy.
Since last year, business has more than doubled, and she’s pleased that these little tropical pieces with a distinctively Asheville twist are sought in places like Brooklyn, Chicago, and San Francisco.
Perhaps most remarkably, she successfully sends them all by U.S. mail. Mignaud reports that she merely “curls the leaves a bit” and then shrouds the plants carefully in bubble wrap. “Out of hundreds and hundreds mailed, maybe one or two has been damaged. It’s really amazing.”
Photos by Matt Rose
Belle Decor Designs, West Asheville. Ally Mignaud’s work can be found locally at the Old Town Salvage Company (1454 Cane Creek Road, Fletcher). She also sells through her website (belledecordesigns.com) and via her Etsy shop, BelleDecorDesigns.