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Mint Home Expands With Mid-Century Mod For Kids' Rooms Called 'Mint Mini'

By Patty Wetli | March 21, 2017 8:34am

LINCOLN SQUARE — The owners of Mint Home, the North Center vintage furnishings store that grew out of an Etsy site, have expanded their family.

Meet Mint Mini, which recently opened at 4949 N. Damen Ave.

The shop has the same emphasis on refurbished furniture — much of it Mid-Century Modern — as its older sibling, but the focus is on home decor to outfit a nursery or children's room.

Ben Shay, whose wife Jessica Kuhny owns the Mint stores with Keisha Bandealy, was manning Mint Mini on a recent afternoon with the couple's 3-year-old daughter as his assistant.

He said the concept was born out of the large number of customers who visited Mint Home, 2117 W. Irving Park Road, searching for furniture for kids, with many of them opting for items such as low dressers to use as changing tables.

The spin-off carries a mix of new items — some sourced from Etsy in a nod to Kuhny and Bandealy's roots — along with vintage finds picked up from estate sales. Kuhny and Bandealy typically sand, paint and seal the furniture, and the items at Mint Mini will largely be redone in brighter colors than Mint Home, Shay said.

Damen Avenue wasn't originally on the Mint team's radar when scouting locations for the new shop, but with neighbors like Bang Bang Pie and a steady flow of foot traffic from shops including District and Alapash up the street, the storefront made perfect sense, said Shay.

"We saw everyone walking by and it has a real family neighborhood feel," he said.