Downtown’s Dede.shop Brings Much-Needed Joy to Decorating

On the busy street corner of Howard and Saratoga in the burgeoning Bromo Arts District sits the striking Dede.shop, the brick-and-mortar home furnishings and accessory arm of interior design studio Décorelle.

Owners Ellen “Elle” Odoi and Yvette Pappoe—technically cousins, though they refer to each other as sisters—moved in this past September as part of the second cohort of the Downtown Partnership of Baltimore’s Black-Owned Occupancy Storefront Tenancy (BOOST) program. Mayor Brandon Scott was there to cut the ribbon.

There are still a lot of abandoned buildings to fill on this part of Howard, but for now, the bright murals, hum of the passing light rail, and nearby businesses like Cuples Tea House and Cajou Creamery, feel promising.

The Crook Horner Building—coincidentally, once home to the Pollack-Blum furniture store—was gutted and the renovation included black and white marble checkered floors, tons of natural light pouring in from floor-to-ceiling windows, and a white painted tin ceiling. The space is chic, cheerful, and gorgeous. (Fifteen large apartment lofts fill the upstairs of the building.)

The front of the shop is filled with accessories including vases, pillows, hand-poured candles, and thick, gorgeous, scalloped trays. There are a lot of muted colors with brass, marble, and travertine accents. Plus, big-ticket items like couches, big chunky coffee tables, heavy wooden sideboards, and stylish lamps. The back of the shop is a workspace with fabric and rug samples, and a big table for meeting with clients.

Odoi and Pappoe are Ghanaian immigrants, who moved to Baltimore when they were both young girls. “We were raised together from birth so we don’t like to be called cousins,” says Odoi. Growing up, they always lived less than five minutes from each other, first in Randallstown and later off Security Boulevard.

The first time they were separated was when Odoi headed to Michigan State University. (Pappoe went to UMBC.) There she found a new passion, participating in dorm room decoration competitions and winning “every single time,” she says with a laugh.

But despite always having a love for the process of decorating, styling, and creating, she never felt like it was something she could do as a career. Still, the feeling that something was missing stuck with her while she pursued a master’s in business and contemplated medical school.

“We have that African background where you’re expected to be an engineer, a lawyer…and even with the design background, you’ve still got to have a master’s and a PhD in something,” she says.

To wit, Pappoe is a lawyer and law professor at the University of the District of Columbia’s David A. Clarke School of Law. Odoi knew she had the talent to pursue design full-time, but didn’t yet trust herself to make the leap.

“I’m risk-adverse,” she admits. So, she continued to work her job in operations.

It was Pappoe who, in 2018, gifted Odoi the official LLC registration of Décorelle, her very part-time side hustle, for Christmas.

“Do what you want with it,” Pappoe told her. “It kind of forced my hand a little bit, but I think it was a good push,” says Odoi. She remembers thinking she was spending all her time managing someone else’s business.

“What would it be like to stop what I’m doing because I’m not happy doing it and put all that effort into building my business?” She gave herself four months. “Five years later, I’m still here.”

Décorelle is run by both Odoi, as the CEO and principal designer, and Pappoe, as co-founder and operations manager (while still working her day job and balancing a brand-new baby). Décorelle is based on the idea that luxury interior design should be within reach.

“That’s our entire mission,” says Pappoe. “To make luxury interior design more accessible. Not cheap, but more accessible.”

When the opportunity came to apply for the BOOST grant, both Odoi and Pappoe thought it felt like a natural transition for the business. With interior design, there’s an intimacy.

“We’re in someone’s home for a year or years,” says Odoi. With retail, it’s more transactional but it also presents more opportunity to create relationships with different people. “We’re hopefully creating products that people love and want to keep buying.”

They hope the range of prices is a selling point, too. “Everyone who comes in here, we want you buy something.” She points to the
pottery—“handmade in Mexico, but they’re like 60 bucks.”

The candles, coasters, canisters, and trays are all curated but affordable. The shop reflects their design style—contemporary with hints of vintage, organic, and the textures, patterns, and earth tones reminiscent of West Africa.

Everything has a clean design but also a warmth. Even the shop’s bathroom, with its fluted marble wall, is paired with wood tones that makes it feel inviting. (The oversized painting that hangs on the wall—“grandmother with a cigar silently judging”—is just the unexpected surprise Odoi loves to use in her designs.)

“We realize that a lot of people just never see our work in person, because they’re all residential,” says Odoi. “It’s really nice to have people walk in and actually physically see the quality of our work and what we do.”

The next step is to finish the workstations for their junior designers and interns who will eventually be working out of the Howard Street building. There will also be the implementation of a program aimed at up-and-coming Black designers.

“A lot of them reach out to me,” says Odoi. “I’ve been very vocal about how it’s a very tough industry to be in and we didn’t get anyone to hold our hand. So, it’s kind of nice to train these young ladies and young men, and just tell them all the secrets that I know.”

Odoi is still constantly learning herself. Just last year, she graduated from the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program, which helps small businesses grow through education, capital, and support services.

Potential for further growth is exciting, but she and Pappoe never want to abandon their Ghanaian roots. The note card that arrives when someone orders online says “thank you” in Ga, which is their language. And their logo incorporates a Kente cloth, a Ghanaian textile made of hand-woven strips of silk and cotton.

“We’re very intentional about these things,” says Odoi.

Now six months into their shop opening, their main goal is simply to be on people’s radar.  “We just want to make sure people know we’re here,” says Pappoe.

Each time Odoi walks through the door, she still gets butterflies, seeing everything they’ve created and knowing she followed her passion. She smiles, “There’s a lot of love in here.”