Shopping

Photograph courtesy of Tayla Mac Boutique

Kittery Crafts

Shopping

The Foreside’s eclectic Tayla Mac Boutique specializes in the unusual and the handmade.

The Owner Thirty-one-year-old Mikayla Parsons, nicknamed Tayla Mac by her grandmother. “She was a huge inspiration, so when I was dreaming up the store, I wanted to do something that was a nod to her.”

The Neighborhood Launched in York in 2016, the shop moved to Wallingford Square in Kittery Foreside the following year. The neighborhood was well into its renaissance. “The food scene set the tone, and the artists and shopkeepers followed.”

What’s Inside Wares from more than 115 crafters, who hail from up the street (jewelry designer Estie Ott) to San Clemente, California (cheeky T-shirt maker The Bee & The Fox). Though just 700 square feet, the shop is remarkably diverse, with pottery, wooden tableware, pillows, tea towels, clothing, body-care products, and greeting cards. The common thread: “I look for companies making things the old-school way — by hand.”

Photographs courtesy of Tayla Mac Boutique

We Love Gorham designer Erin Flett’s colorful, washable Lollipop lunch bags; Boothbay potter Alison Evans’s oyster platters and barnacle salt and pepper shakers; Cabooties’ patterned-canvas baby shoes; and discovering goods we haven’t seen elsewhere in Maine, like embroidered pillows from Brooklyn’s Coral & Tusk (above). Plus, Parsons can tell you the story behind every item she carries.

72 Wallingford Sq., Kittery. 207-703-2570. taylamacboutique.com