One Scoop at a Time

Chantell Boissiere-Kelly M’05 Builds Community Through Her Ice Cream Shop

When Capital Ice Cream is open, the love spills from behind the counter onto the beaming faces of people strolling along Capitol Avenue with frozen treats in hand. Many others with sunny smiles gather at a rainbow of patio tables outside the shop.

Adding joy and vibrance to an area of Hartford that is lifting itself out of decades of distress had been a dream of Boissiere-Kelly and her husband, Shane, since the couple moved to their Frog Hollow home 16 years ago. Before their family grew to include three children, Boissiere-Kelly says, “We would walk down this street with our dogs, and it was just a shallow place. We’d want ice cream, and we’d go to Baskin-Robbins in West Hartford. We thought, wouldn’t it be nice to have something in our neighborhood. We didn’t know it was going to be ice cream at the time, but we knew this area had so much potential.”

Boissiere-Kelly feels that “Hartford gets a bad rap, but there are some special things that happen here that people just don’t know about. It’s been nice to be a part of the things that make Hartford special.”

The community agrees. Intermingled in the hundreds of four- and five-star social media reviews is a lot of appreciation for the “happy place in Hartford” and its friendly staff.

Capital Ice Cream

“This little ice cream shop is a gem in Hartford’s Frog Hollow neighborhood,” one reviewer wrote. “The owners are incredibly friendly and welcoming, the decor is fun and colorful, and best of all, the ice cream is delicious.”

Boissiere-Kelly admits the road to Capital Ice Cream has been circuitous. Following strong family ties to Connecticut after graduating from high school in New Orleans, she earned a degree in marketing from Central Connecticut State University, before graduating from the University of Hartford with a Master of Arts in Communication. Through a joint media relations program with Boston University, she took an internship in Los Angeles, working on shows like The Bold and the Beautiful and with MTV. After the internship, MTV offered her an assistant producer job. Eventually, she landed in New York. “I was doing the New York commute from Connecticut, which was tough, getting up at 4 in the morning and then coming back every night. So, then I applied for a position at Adams & Knight in Avon, and they hired me.”

While working at the marketing agency on a campaign for United Way, Boissiere- Kelly discovered her passion. “Working on the United Way campaign was a really rewarding time in my career,” she says. “I realized I needed to do something that mattered, something that was moving people’s lives.”

Because she was a nanny during college, Boissiere-Kelly knew she liked working with children. “My godchildren attended Montessori school. So, I started going to visit and observe. I was like, you know what? I want to be a teacher. Montessori felt like the right fit for me in terms of how they work with the children, not just academically, but emotionally and socially.”

Boissiere-Kelly returned to UHart for certification classes toward a teaching degree. “It was like coming home,” she says. UHart has “opened pathways to so many opportunities.”

Her diverse academic and work experience has fed her professional and personal development as a teacher and entrepreneur. She currently teaches pre-K and kindergarten at Annie Fisher Montessori in Hartford, where she’s been for 12 years.

We’d like something,” Boissiere-Kelly says, “that’s owned by people who live in Hartford, who are invested in Hartford, who went to school in Hartford, who taught in Hartford, and who are of Hartford.

Chantell Boissiere-Kelly M’05

“Teaching fulfills something completely different in me,” Boissiere-Kelly says. “Watching children come in with minimal knowledge and seeing them flourish and grow, you know what you’re doing is really making a difference.”

The ice cream shop, which opened in 2017, evolved from knowing what type of city Boissiere-Kelly and her husband wanted their children to grow up in, she explains. “I want to leave a legacy for my children in addition to leaving something for Hartford. Being part of something that people can look at for years to come, the kids growing up and seeing that. That motivates me.”

IT’S BEEN NICE TO BE A PART OF THE THINGS THAT MAKE HARTFORD SPECIAL.

Sign A Happy Place in Hartford

Ultimately, the couple would like to have a larger location that offers more things—a community-type space bringing families together to spend quality time.

Capital Ice Cream logo