astrid_design
Astrid Hoffman hopes her shop inspires people not to “buy brand-new things all the time.”   David Briggs

A doorknocker from Colombia in the shape of a lion’s head, the animal’s jaw clutching the brass oval ($200). A set of four white-and-gold espresso cups and saucers from Japan ($40). An old candle snifter ($35). An antique astrology print of a winged, robed woman ($75). In the jewel-box space at the back of Flower Power in Point Reyes Station, these objects and more are collected and arranged in a mini-store, Astrid Design Home, that just celebrated its one-year anniversary. “I’m an interior designer by training, and I’ve always wanted to have a retail space,” said Astrid Lindo, who continues to operate her interior design business, Astrid Design Studio, as well as The Living Seed, the organic seed business she runs with her husband, Matthew Hoffman. Ms. Lindo started her interior design business about a decade ago, following a degree from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York, stints designing stage sets and time working for a designer in Los Angeles. The new store, which occupies a 100-square-foot space that used to be the vault of a bank, functions as an outlet for both her frequent trips to vintage and thrift shops—she’s been visiting them since high school—and her vision of ecological and sustainable design. “My focus is on ecological interior design, so everything I have here is antique or vintage or salvaged. It’s to inspire people that they don’t need to buy brand-new things all the time. Stunning things already exist and are well made and have a lot more character and are often a lot more beautiful.” Popular items include espresso cups, frames, mirrors and glassware, and her inventory is often acquired during trips to visit family in places like Phoenix. (“The Bay Area is way picked over,” she noted.) The store also stocks salvaged-wood air plant holders, fashioned by Mr. Hoffman. She said that her aesthetic doesn’t fit into a neat box, but instead represents vast interests inspired by locales in the United States and abroad: she was born in Colombia, raised in Miami and has lived in New York, Spain, Italy, Los Angeles and San Francisco. “My style spans a lot of places and time periods,” she said, noting a gilded mirror in the shop from Italy that some, she said, might find gaudy. “But to me, it’s beautiful.”