When Monique Bonner turned 50 in 2020, she decided to leave the world of technology marketing, where she’d worked for 20 years at Dell and other major companies, and do something she’d always dreamed of: start a home-goods store. But the pandemic was raging at the time, so the Middlebury College alum launched her shop online. She named it Addison West to honor where she lived: on West Street in the Addison County town of Cornwall.
Since then, Addison West has grown considerably. It now occupies a small retail space in Middlebury’s historic Stone Mill and a wonderfully rambling, 5,000-square-foot one on Main Street in Waitsfield. The latter is an 1834 building previously occupied for 35 years by the Store, a kitchen-supply emporium. It also houses Addison West’s recently launched design services. Packing and shipping for online sales — now 30 percent of the business — take place in the basement.
Bonner led Nest through the Waitsfield store just as the holiday season was peaking, making it difficult for this reporter to separate work from gift shopping. Addison West aspires to be the area’s destination for gift finding, and it does not disappoint. Shoppers can swing by minutes before a dinner party for an artful bouquet and a bottle of bubbly from the well-stocked wine fridge. Or they can browse themed sections of the store that Bonner calls “vignettes”: areas focused on gardening, cooking, fishing, pickleball and more.
The tour began in “the pit,” a slightly sunken area to the right of the entrance where grain was dumped when the building served as a farm-supply store. The pit offers gifts that men didn’t know they wanted: a leather punching bag hanging from a chain; Liberty puzzles, distinctive for their laser-cut wood pieces; Kalastyle’s wood-scented soaps with an ax on the packaging; shearling slippers from France.
Actually, I wanted those slippers, too; the pit’s masculine theme is just a suggestion. After all, the whole crew at Addison West is female, including lead designer Bibiana De Souza, Waitsfield store manager Anna Mays, operations manager Maxine Eaton, and brand and digital director Elisabeth Waller, who shadowed our tour taking photos for the company’s Instagram account. Everyone multitasks. De Souza packages up online orders, for instance, and Mays creates the bouquets and organizes events for customers.
“Vermont is part of who we are, part of the design aesthetic that drives us.” Monique Bonner
De Souza is from Brazil. Bonner, whose mother is French, lived in Ireland for seven years and traveled around Europe for marketing jobs. The women’s tastes extend beyond standard Vermont: Plaids on upholstered furniture are muted, chic place mats are by New York City studio Chilewich, and a design for built-in kitchen cabinets — which De Souza generated with an artificial intelligence program — is sleek and contemporary.
Plenty of Vermont-made work is also on offer, including Elli Parr Jewelry by Sara Nelson of South Burlington, huge heirloom baskets made by Kristine Myrick Andrews of Salisbury, pieces by Burlington’s AO Glass and white ceramics printed with anatomically detailed goat drawings by Laura Zindel of Brattleboro.
Bonner also collaborates with out-of-state artists to create items exclusive to Addison West, such as small white dishes featuring line drawings of covered bridges, ski-lift chairs and other Vermont-y designs by a Massachusetts artist. Bonner approached a California company that imprints canvas bags with “Ski” in giant letters to create a “Ski VT” bag in the store’s earthy green and tan colors. Similarly, an international hooked-wool pillow company produces the store’s “Ski VT” decorative pillows.
Each of these collaborations takes an average of six months to develop, Bonner said. That sounds daunting, but her enthusiasm for retail goes all the way back to her childhood in Andover, Mass. In sixth grade, Bonner said, she and her best friend founded Preppy Proprietor to sell handmade ribbon barrettes. Her second company, Mittens by Mo, taught Bonner a valuable economics lesson: Hand-knitting earned her an unsustainable 25 cents an hour.
Her first paid job, at age 12 — wrapping presents at a Pappagallo’s clothing store — clinched her interest in retail. “It was so joyful,” Bonner said. “It just stuck with me.”
That joy is evident everywhere in Addison West. A clothing rack holds men’s corduroy shirts and women’s loungewear alongside sequined party dresses. A kit for making smoked cocktails is next to the wine fridge. Upstairs, among the building’s original wood ceiling beams, cozy furniture scenarios include a fully dressed bed with sheepskin throws. (Furniture has to be carried up the stairs; Bonner is contemplating where to install a freight elevator.)
Addison West collaborates with Edgewater Gallery in Middlebury to hold receptions and exhibit its artists at the Waitsfield store. Currently, Vermont photographer Jim Westphalen‘s large-format landscapes are on view in the airy design room upstairs. There, customers can select sofa fabrics or plan their bathroom makeover.
Bonner, who worked in Colorado and Massachusetts as a young graduate, said she always wanted to return to Vermont to open a business. She moved back in 2011.
“I think Vermonters are very conscious consumers, and they care about supporting local businesses,” she said. “At the same time, it’s a small state, so we rely very much on the visitors and people who vacation here. Vermont is part of who we are, part of the design aesthetic that drives us.”
Among Bonner’s ambitions are growing national brand recognition and acquiring a separate warehouse space for expanding online sales. Meanwhile, however, she’s fully savoring her dream job.
“It’s the thing I’ve wanted to do my entire life,” she said. “I work harder than I have ever worked, and I cannot wait to get up in the morning and get started.”
The original print version of this article was headlined “West-ward Expansion | Home-goods boutique Addison West grows in Vermont”
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This article appears in Nest — Winter 2025.
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