Our Croydon talent is real and SO demonstrated by these festive decorations of colour!
Croydon based business, March Muses, are changing the world one decoration at a time by adding colour to Christmas trees worldwide! The business, which was set up and is run by Natalie Duvall and Alison Burton, recently had a pop-up at London store Selfridges to sell handmade Black Santas, angels and nutcrackers with close attention paid to details such as skin tone, hair design, body shape and size. This pop-up has now led to a 2022 partnership with the flagship store.
But not forgetting their roots, you’ll also find March Muses at Treasures on Portland road in South Norwood.
Natalie said: “Raising daughters in the UK is no easy feat, and raising daughters who are Black is even harder! Last Christmas when decorating our Christmas tree, the girls wanted to hang fairies and put a beautiful queen fairy as the tree topper. So off I went, looking online for fairies/angels and tree toppers that represented myself and my girls.
“I’m an Amazon/Ebay/Etsy queen, and after three days of searching I finally found some Christmas ornaments of colour BUT they were being shipped from the USA with a £20 postage and package fee! Why should we pay so much just to see fairies and angels that look like us? We ended up using a Black Barbie as a tree topper!
“So Alison and I decided to create a range of festive decorations that represented US.”
Alison said: “After a never ending search to find festive ornaments etc that look like us, Natalie and I decided to create our own range and bring them to market ourselves! Seeing the kids’ faces light up when they feel represented on the Christmas tree is just magical and these products are long overdue in the UK.”
Martyn Stroud, buying director at Selfridges said: “March Muses is an inspiring brand created by mums on a mission to help make the festive season more inclusive and we’re incredibly excited to kick-start a partnership in our Oxford Street store this Christmas and next.”
The unique business name comes from March being the birth month of both co-founders, and each figurine being named after an inspirational person of colour also born in March! Why not check them out and get your own Aretha, Chaka or Mariah to brighten up your tree! marchmuses.co.uk