A FAMILY run jewellery business boasting the likes of Sheridan Smith and Alison Hammond as customers is set to open their first store.

Kooky Bloom, owned by Sophie Mitchell, will open on Antelope Walk, Dorchester, on Saturday, June 18th.

The business was set up during the first lockdown as a means of staying busy. What started as “just a hobby” soon turned into a full-time job, however, with over 45,000 items of hand-crafted jewellery being sold worldwide since the online store opened for orders.

Sophie, who previously worked for New Look, said she had been blown away by the support. She said: “We were so lucky on social media that we reached quite a lot of people and it flew: within six months I was able to leave the job that I was in and not only go full-time but employ my husband as well.”

Kooky Bloom specialises in real flower jewellery and began through a love of all things floral and unusual… and a timely YouTube advert, as Sophie explained: “I’ve always been artistic and loved making things but an advert literally just popped up about making jewellery and I thought ‘oh I’d love to give that a try’ and, yeah, now it’s a business and it’s an amazing feeling.”

Sophie said her family had never planned to have a physical presence for the business but “fell in love straight away” with the shop on 16 Antelope Street. The store presents an exciting opportunity for an already blooming business.

Sophie said: “We’re learning every single day. We are so grateful and, I say it all the time but, I am still amazed by it. Whenever we do a big restock we’re up until like 2am just packing orders but it’s so worth it, it really is: it still feels surreal that we’re opening up a shop.

“I never thought we’d have our own store but this opportunity came up and to have a store in our home town is amazing. It would be great to have Dorset pay the shop a visit and get to know us a bit more.””