Master Your Summer Aesthetic with Help from Local Home and Garden Experts

Summertime is a chance to bask in the sun and share time with loved ones, but it’s also a time to update and beautify your home.

Adding fresh flowers and plants to your landscape can provide a pop of color before the cool months return. To try out your green thumb, visit both The OIL Shed and The Barn for flowers, plants, gifts and home decor unique to Oxford.
If it’s time for an interior remodel, Stout’s Carpet offers seasonal in-style flooring, and Sugar Magnolia has all the antique items you’ll want to add to your collection.
If you’ve caught the “Fixer Upper” bug (along with the rest of the nation), try browsing these local home goods stores that offer a truly unique experience.

Sugar Magnolia
Whether you’re looking for handmade Ole Miss team merchandise or collectables to spruce up your home’s decor, the largest antique mall in Oxford has what you need.
Located at 1919 University Ave., Sugar Magnolia has a variety of knick-knacks including T-shirts, baby clothes, pottery, candles, picture frames, records, pillows and lamps.
“Day to day and hour by hour [the merchandise] varies,” a store employee, Melony, said. “Some days people want contemporary pieces like gold and white, but on other days they just want a simple bath bomb.”
Several families who are repeat customers will come in the store and buy $80 worth on bath bombs alone,” she said.
Sugar Magnolia separates itself from other antique store competitors by housing more than 60 booths, owned by different vendors, compiled in one store.
“Having a revolving door with vendors makes it exciting,” Melony said. “It’s a fun environment and something is new every month.”
When school starts, the antique mall kicks in full swing.
“The majority of our customers are college students who come in and have pictures of what they want, so my job is to help them find the best fit,” Melony said. “That is the most satisfying.”

OIL Shed
A dream became a reality when two longtime best friends started a home and garden shop in the fall of 2017.
Kecia Kirk and Wendy Carmean are Oxford natives but did not meet until high school. They both moved to Corinth but later returned to the Oxford community. Together the two women discovered they have always had a passion for home decor and gardening.
The two entrepreneurs transformed what was an old, rundown shed to a “she-shed” featuring French antiques, a variety of plants, candles, pillows, wreaths and other gifts.
Oxford Interior Landscape, known as OIL Shed to its customers, is behind the new Oxford Canteen on 764 North Lamar Blvd. They offer a variety of flowers for sale, but they consider themselves more so a plant store.
Holidays are a busy time of year, but the owners said they are prepared to serve the community at a moment’s notice.
“I order double the amount of flowers and plants prior to Valentine’s Day, because that is our busiest time of year,” Kirk said. “Dads, husbands and grandpas come in and out all day long looking to get their loved one a gift.”
By helping people make their homes feel new and fresh, the owners said they want the store to be an oasis for the community.
“I want our store to be almost like retail therapy,” Carmean said. “I want to teach people how to arrange flowers. I love being a resource for plant lovers so they can have them in their homes.”
The Barn
Oxford’s premier gardening center is a source for gardening essentials, seasonal must-haves, animal feed, and home decor to complement your living space.
Turner and Brittany Barns opened The Barn on 2657 W. Oxford Loop in 2010, and it has been a staple in the Oxford community ever since.
Brittany is in charge of operating the store, but often the couple comes together to make creative decisions.
“It takes a team here,” Brittany said.
Sun patients, Lantanas, and pine straw is in local demand, she said.
“We have to make sure the plants live in this current climate zone,” Wilson Kidd, an employee, said. “The plants we order are based off of customer demand and their own uniqueness.”
Aside from offering a variety of flowers and plants for your home, customer service is a top priority for The Barn.
“That’s why people shop with us,” Walker Gossett, another employee said. “We want to make sure that every person who walks through our front door comes back.”
Stout’s Carpet
Home flooring is a choice that homeowners consider when looking to remodel or spruce up their walkways.
Stout’s Carpet, located on 2 Skyline Dr., provides a large selection of options from wood, tile and solid or tight weave carpet.
“Wooden floors are easier and low-maintenance and almost look better when they are distressed, but carpet has a warmth-feel and provides a softness under people’s feet,” manager Casey Martin said.
Neutral colors are a popular choice at Stout’s Carpet.
“Solid colors like light and dark brown or light and dark grey sells the most,” Martin said.
Business during the summer months picks up as people are moving, remodeling or wanting something new home for their home or office, he said.
The employees at Stout’s Carpet try to make sure customers feel comfortable with their purchase when they walk out the door.
“I want to be as much a part of the process as they want me to be,” Martin said. “Young adults come in here not knowing where to start, and that’s where I jump in to help.”

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By hottytoddy.com intern Cameron Riser