Shop Local This Holiday Season At The Providence Center

The Gifts That Give Shop Helps Support The Providence Center And Its Mission

 

Are you looking for local and handmade gifts this holiday season? The Providence Center’s Gifts that Give shop employs a local potter, Ashley Wright, and woodworker, Peter Petruk, to create items for the shop. A few of the Providence Center’s artists with disabilities are employed to work alongside Wright and Petruk, said Aimee Bullen, the director of development and community relations.

 

“About 70 to 75 percent are items handmade at Providence Center, and that’s all of the woodwork and the pottery work,” said Jacqueline Short, the sales and community relations representative. “The other crafts that are in the store are other Maryland-made vendors, and they donate a percentage of their sales to the Providence Center.”

 

In addition to supporting the Providence Center, the gift shop helps spread its mission. The products provide “something tangible that people can see and feel and then want to know more about what we do,” Bullen said.

 

“That connects us to business owners that help our ultimate mission, which is getting our clients employed in the community,” Short said. “We want to get them all out in the community with jobs and earning paychecks and living the most fulfilled life possible. It all links together, and I’ve watched that connection happen over and over and over again.”

 

For the holiday season, Gifts that Give is selling wooden ornaments and holiday pottery items.

 

The Providence Center Gifts that Give Shop is located at 1254 Ritchie Highway South in Arnold.