People of the OCQ: Dee
A lovely woman carrying a few shopping bags out of Damsels, goes up to the store owner Dee to give her a warm embrace. “I have been coming to your store since you first opened and I was a young teacher, excited to have some extra funds to spend on some nice clothes,” she reminisces with Dee.
That was fifty years ago.
What began as a small, 270 square foot boutique in 1974, slowly expanded over the years as Dee knocked out walls whenever a neighboring tenant moved out. The historic 1919 building still maintains its rustic charm, with Dee opening up the ceiling and decorating the walls in Paris inspired paintings throughout.
Dee, a single mom of two little children, saw a for rent sign in front of what is now Damsels. “I thought, what can I do with this space? I thought of Carnaby Street in London and imagined myself running my own tiny boutique,” Dee remembers.
Her dreams didn’t stop at the boutique though. As she slowly expanded the store, her vision for the area also grew. At the time, there was a roller rink and a sheet metal business out back. Dee had told the sheet metal owner she was going to do something with the space one day. She had a big dream, but no money to make her plans come to life. Dee struck a deal with the retiring sheet metal worker and managed to pre-sale seven condos to finance the project which is now Knightsbridge, a three story, fifteen unit building between Heritage Mews and Harbourview Manor.
“Then I had a whole book done on the Mews. I envisioned Knightsbridge overlooking shops and services that had everything you could think of,” Dee explains.
Dee used the profit from the condo development to buy more properties which would become the beloved Heritage Mews complex. When the building was first built, Dee had business owners all sign five-year leases.
“I helped them get their business plans together and I never had a vacancy for five years. They were all successful.”
The idea of the Old City Quarter came after a meeting with local business owners to create an official business hub in the area.
“In France, they had the French Quarter and other places had similar names, so that’s how we came up with the Old City Quarter,” Dee explains. “We used to have a slogan ‘cross the bridge to the grace and charm of Nanaimo.”
Dee believes the charm of the Old City Quarter lives in the thoughtful architecture of the buildings and natural elements, and that all the shops and services are owned by local business owners like herself.
Dee jokes that Damsels has been half of her life and it has been her daughter Gina’s whole life, who still works at the store alongside her mom. Dee loves seeing generations of women coming into the store. “We can have three generations shopping here,” she explains. “I have sold mom’s their dress for their wedding, then their daughter’s prom dress, and now selling clothes to her granddaughter.”
When asked what words of wisdom would she share to entrepreneurs starting out on their own dreams, Dee says “Follow your dreams. To be successful in anything, you have to have a vision. I was a visionary. I took just horrible properties and tore them down and build up something beautiful like Knightsbridge and the Mews,” she continues. “You need to envision something. And if you follow that and you stay true with it, you will be successful.”
Damsels is located at 413 Fitzwilliam Street in the Old City Quarter. Check them out Monday to Saturday from 10am – 5pm and discover why this beautiful boutique has been around for the last 50 years.