A new handmade gift shop in Elkford has popped up just in time for the holiday season.
The Bath Shack is located at 65 Cariboo Dr. and is run out of owner Debbie Kliment’s newly renovated garage. The shop opened on Nov. 13.
“It’s been busy. Feedback from the community has been amazing,” Kliment said.
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Kliment has been producing bath-ware out of her home for years. Up until recently, she had been selling her wares at craft fairs and farmer’s markets.
About six years ago, her husband Peter started to fall ill. Around a year ago, he was diagnosed with Lewy body dementia, and moved to Rocky Mountain Village retirement community in Fernie.
Peter had a woodworking shop in the garage. He was “an amazing woodworker,” Kliment said.
“He made me promise that I would move my business out there if he couldn’t work in his shop anymore.”
So, that’s what Kliment did. It was difficult and emotional to convert everything over. She had to sell all of Peter’s old tools and clean out the shop. But she had lots of help from family to get the job done.
“It was a lot bigger job that I anticipated. But now that it’s done, it’s very rewarding.”
The former garage is now split into two parts: the back is a workshop for Kliment to craft her bath-and-body products (such as soaps, bath bombs, shower steamers, and body butters, among other things) and the front is turned into a boutique shop filled with handmade items from fellow artisans.
Products come in from all around: some from Elkford, others from Moyie, and others still from near Alberta.
The shelves are stocked with wool overcoats for kids, crochet slippers, knit hats, hand-blown glass-ware, pottery, hot sauces, photography, artwork, walking sticks, mugs, honey, candles, and silver jewellery, to name a few things.
She says she has “a lot of stuff in there.”
Some moms have already come by with their kids looking for birthday presents for birthday parties, she said.
Kliment is always looking for new artisans with different products to add to the shop.
There isn’t a lot of shopping in Elkford, she said, and The Bath Shack will be a good place for people to go for last minute gifts.
“I think it’s good for Elkford.”
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