Joan Horton - JHorton Store, Connecticut
Today was a Williamsburg adventure day with the intrepid Joan Horton from JHorton Store in Madison Connecticut. I love working with Joanie. Her never ending quest for the new and exciting has led her from being VP of Corporate Communications for Revlon to having her own Lifestyle store.
We started out navigating the streets of Williamsburg in search amazing organic teak bowls. They are so beautiful and capable of withstanding the punishment of the outdoors. We compared and contrasted several petrified wood stumps to act as cocktail tables, seating and pedestals. Finding elements of Pat Steir’s drip paintings and loving the simple yet distinct differences in each and every one.
After the bowls were dusted and polished we took our starved selves on a safari through Williamsburg. The now pristine hipster hood is home to countless shops and restaurants but we had bigger game in mind. Mast Brothers. That’s right, we needed chocolate.
With our steady guide, Waze, we found ourselves at Mast Brothers Brew Bar. Furniture shopping on an empty stomach is never a good idea and so the perfectly broken squares of dark chocolate imbedded with pepitas, cranberries, almonds and did I detect a hint of bitter orange?, was gobbled up in about 30 seconds as we were schooled on the latest brew from The Brothers who brought chocolate back to Brooklyn. We chose the salted caramel and watched as the cacao nibs were ground in a special grinder so as not to disrupt the healthful butters and then the grinds were prepared in what looks like a tea bag, covered in boiling water and steeped like tea. Add some simple syrup and it was truly a new taste sensation. So new it propelled us down the street to the factory to snatch up an assortment of truffles and bonbons to take back to the prisoners on Manhattan island.