Pickleboots

Photo: Beth Levendis

“Everyone in the area is either walking around with a baby or pregnant,” says Melanie Williams, the owner of this new custom bedding and furniture shop in Park Slope. After moving from Manhattan’s Financial District to Brooklyn with her husband and seven-year-old daughter, Dorothy, last December, the FIT grad and visual merchandiser noticed right away that the neighborhood was missing something. “There are plenty of clothing stores for kids, but no place for moms and dads to furnish their little one’s nursery,” she explains.

Williams now works with 200 different fabrics (available by the yard for $12–$30) to create sheets, pillows, bed skirts and bumpers—you can even personalize them with your child’s name. Upon entering the store, parents can choose a style from the “swatch wall” or flip through swatch books—designs include Flower Crystals (a mod ’70s-style print), Groovy Guitar (for young music lovers), Seventh Inning (a retro baseball print) and Good Old Stripe (self-explanatory). As anticipated, parents tend to go for the more contemporary, trendy patterns—this is Park Slope, after all. “Traditional floral is just not flying off the shelves,” says Williams, unsurprised.

In addition to bedding, Pickleboots will soon offer the El Greco furniture line. But unlike the home decor stores popping up in other Brooklyn nabes (read: Dumbo), the shop’s collection won’t be supermodern—no Oeuf or Argington cribs and toddler beds here. “I like to think of our furniture as cottage style with modern colors,” says Williams. She’s also stocking the store with gifts, toys, books, Oopsy Daisy wall art and other accessories—including some, like an embroidered Brooklyn pillow, that give a shout-out to her favorite borough.

Although Williams spends her days designing and decorating the bedrooms of Park Slope kids, she admits there’s one room that still needs some fixing up: her daughter’s. She says, “It’s a work in progress. We’re getting there…slowly.”—Kim Weinstein

Pickleboots, 178A Lincoln Pl between Seventh and Eighth Aves, Park Slope, Brooklyn (718-622-1200, pickleboots.com).