Three questions for Stella McClure - www.thestellarboutique.com

Meet Stella McClure, an active champion of all things natural and online vintage boutique owner. We met on a rooftop in the Marrakech medina last year and have been updating from base to base ever since. I felt like asking her a couple of questions for the blog !

Tell me about your farm

Set amongst rural farmland and olive groves, the farm is my little slice of tranquillity in a crazy world.It's also The Stellar Boutique HQ - I turned one of the barns into an office so it's now a little Aladdin's cave, and the old Spanish farmhouse together with its rambling garden provides the perfect back drop for our fashion shoots! I've managed to accumulate a not so small menagerie of waifs n strays along the way, we currently have about 30 animals and it's growing by the day! We grow our own veg and try to live off the land wherever possible so there's always plenty to do and never a dull moment, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I used to be a city girl but I swapped concrete for rugged terrain and never looked back.

Tell me about your boutique

I set up the boutique 2 years ago as an outlet for new designers, jewellery makers and artisans to showcase their work and to offer customers something more unique and individual. The current ethos of teaching shoppers 'how to dress like a celebrity' as at so many online stores drives me crazy! It stops people thinking for themselves and leads to the death of originality. I like to encourage customers to have fun with fashion and experiment with their own personal sense of style.
I've always loved vintage clothing and old relics, I used to sell vintage on Portobello Road market, so it was a natural decision to sell vintage in the shop. I feel quite passionate that wearing vintage is a genius way to recycle and consume less as well as keeping fashion more interesting and creative at the same time. It's great that so many people now mix vintage into their wardrobes, it's really taken off over the last few years.

The future ?

I've just recruited my first member of staff, so I'm looking forward to focusing more of my attention on the buying side, having more time for photo shoots and generally pushing the business forward. Designing The Stellar Boutique Tshirt range is next on my agenda, I have lots of ideas rattling around my head, but all in good time!


On the shelves soon :

Freshly back from a Marrakech buying trip ! There's new collections of boho bags, belts and jewellery in store very soon. Plus, there's a gorgeous new summer collection from new designer 'Maggie+Me' and a cool range of digital print galaxy T's by 'Your Eyes Lie' arriving in May...