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Business & Tech

Seeking Decorative Inspiration at Sterling Place

Curiosities nestle among tasteful pieces of country furniture at the Park Slope branch.

For writers, Virginia Woolf prescribes a room of one’s own. As I’ve had that covered for a while, I thought it more pressing to track down a desk.

(in two locations, at 352 Seventh Avenue at 10th Street and 363 Atlantic Avenue between Hoyt and Bond) sources antique furniture and country house cast-offs outside the city, then spruces them up for resale. The Park Slope branch is crammed with tasteful desks, dressers, bookshelves, tables and quirkier items, like an elegant chair with a built-in telephone side-table ($245) and a gentleman’s case of grooming tools and accessories like an English razor ($125) and crossword cufflinks ($159).

I found a fold-down oak desk to salivate over ($495), with little nooks for storing notes and doodles scratched into the desktop by a previous owner. A ledge provides space for stacking notebooks and knick-knacks, and a small built-in mirror means the desk could moonlight as a dressing table.

Jim Christensen, store manager, said the owners — a married couple, Rob Wilson and Elizabeth Crowell, who named the store after their Park Slope street — visit several auctions each month outside the city and look for items in good condition. Wilson “has an eye for what sells,” Christensen said. “They get country things most people in the city don’t have time to get.”

The Slope store, which opened about three years ago, attracts more neighborhood browsers than the larger Atlantic Avenue branch. The smaller items of furniture tend to get diverted to Seventh Avenue: things suitable for studios or cozy apartments.

With the addition of “curiosities” like a vintage French alarm clock ($82) and a set of coasters that depict a historic map of Prospect Park ($48), the store is " trying to include things that are a little unusual yet could be in your best friend’s apartment,” Christensen said.

Although I admired the oak desk, the Muse didn’t summon me to claim it. I’m holding out for The One. Until then, I’m making do with the plain plywood version I adopted, Park Slope-style, for free off the street.

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