4 minute read
Business
BOTANICAL BUSINESS BLOSSOMS WITH STUDIO OPENING
PH entrepreneur-mom counts on teammates at work and home
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By Samantha Ponce
Special Contributor
Courtney Goldberg’s low-maintenance botanical arrangements business began out of a desire to decorate her Preston Hollow home with greenery.
The renovation budget for the Goldbergs’ ranch-style home didn’t allow much for professional plant décor, so she began creating low-maintenance terrariums and modern botanical designs.
Soon family, friends, and potential customers took notice, and Urban Spikes began as a home business.
“Our home was a big part of the beginning of my business because it gave me this space to evolve the business,” Goldberg said.
She had worked in public relations for Edelman’s Dallas office, managing brand communications and events such as Lollapalooza and South by Southwest for the likes of the Dickies, Hilton Anatole, Wyndham Resorts, Nissan, and Metro PCS.
In 2016, Goldberg, now a mother of three boys younger than 9, decided to leave the corporate world to have a more flexible schedule and focus on her growing family.
Her botanical design hobby bloomed into a business as she realized there were few options for low maintenance, luxurious plant designs for people with busy lifestyles.
Goldberg created Urban Spikes to offer the happy medium between everyday nurseries and high-end floral shops.
She operated out of her home for the first three years, working pop-up events, holiday markets, and online sales.
Shortly before the pandemic, she moved Urban Spikes out of her living room and garage (much to the delight of her husband, Chad) and opened a new design studio northwest of Galleria Dallas in Farmers Branch.
From there, her team of four creates custom designs for customers’ homes and offices, and as pandemic protocols have loosened, they have welcomed customers into the store.
Urban Spikes recently celebrated its fifth anniversary, and Goldberg’s 14th wedding anniversary arrived in December.
Managing a small business and family of young children requires a solid team at home and work, she said. “We all have to do our part. I don’t think you can do it alone.”
FROM LEFT: The Urban Spikes botanical arrangements team members McKenna Humphrey, Courtney Goldberg, Jennifer
West, and Yulianna Rodriguez. (PHOTOS: ASH GONGORA)
Shannon Wynne has been called many things over the years, most notably “successful restauranteur” and perennial “cool kid.”
Raised in Highland Park, Shannon is known for creating some of Dallas’ most vibrant clubs of the ‘80s and ‘90s – now just memories without landmarks as most of the buildings that housed his ventures have been demolished.
Today, he co-owns and operates five successful restaurant concepts: Flying Fish; Flying Saucer Draught Emporium; Meddlesome Moth; Rodeo Goat; and Miriam Cocina Latina. All are visually rich with particular cultures, from Flying Fish’s East Texas fish camp vibe to Rodeo Goat’s rustic Texas barn to Miriam’s radiant, warm, and understated elegance.
Shannon’s a preservationist, a supporter of preserving something, specifically historic buildings and artifacts. He has advocated for maintaining the architecture of the Park Cities. Largely, and sadly, to no avail.
He would like to talk to folks who come from other states and tear down some of the community’s most important houses.
“I would tell them that the homes were built by significant architects,” Wynne said. “We had our own style, a prairie style. We didn’t create it; it wasn’t ours, but it was certainly [prevalent] in this region.”
The blocky styles that are replacing the architectural gems don’t reflect the history of this place, he added. Nor do they honor it.
Wynne also has a heart for East Texas, specifically Caddo Lake, and has built an outdoor amphitheater there to allow locals to host fundraising events for the lake and its surrounding natural elements. One of Texas’ few natural lakes, Caddo, has been infiltrated by dangerous plant life that threatens to choke out native plant and aquatic life, and, true to form, the preservationist made a short film about it to help raise awareness.
With his restaurants now in six states, preserving the cultures that make his concepts so special has not been easy. Restaurant success is sometimes just
catching lightning in a bottle, but Wynne’s done it. His success is likely due to his authenticity and brilliant insight into people and places. Shannon and his partners have succeeded in this notoriously fickle business and, thankfully, survived the pandemic. In a quick round table of favorites, Shannon revealed some of his go-to menu items in Dallas. Carbone’s Lasagna, which he says is the best in town; Las Palmas’ Spinach and Crab Salad; any fish at Montlake Cut, and Miriam’s Ceviche, which includes tiger KERSTEN RETTIG shrimp and baby octopus and might well be the best bite of food you’ll ever eat. At 70, Shannon is looking outward and onward. The friend, mentor, employer, husband, dad, and now “Shan Daddy” to three grandchildren born in the last year isn’t retiring. “Building is fun,” he said of his projects, including the restoration of historic homes in the Cedars. Keep building and preserving, Shannon. Dallas is better for it. Follow Kersten Rettig, a Park Cities-based writer with 30-plus years of experience in food and beverage marketing and public relations, on Instagram @KerstenEats.
Shannon Wynne says, “Building is Fun.”
(PHOTO: JIMMY NGO)
