Beaded Dreams an Ottawa original

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If a buffalo head staring out from a plaque on a wall doesn't grab your attention, the smell of sweetgrass makes you realize Beaded Dreams is no ordinary store. In fact it's the only Native-owned store of its kind in Ottawa.

The store features Native arts and crafts ranging from bone chokers to medicine wheels, herbs, ceremonial and healing items, and gifts and souvenirs from across Canada. And, as owner Niki Wabanonik stresses, everything in the store is Native-made - there is nothing mass-produced in Taiwan.

Wabanonik has 18 years of jewelry-making experience and crafts many of the items found in the store. She started Beaded Dreams because she loves Native arts and crafts.

"I had a feeling Ottawa needed something like this," adds the James Bay Cree from Lac Simon, Que. "There's no shops around her if you want sweetgrass."

A loan from the Ontario government's New Ventures program helped Wabanonik start the business. The program offers entrepreneurs loans up to a maximum of $15,000, guaranteed by the province, to start new, full-time businesses in the province.

Financial institutions assess applicants and administer the loans. In the eastern Ontario region, where Beaded Dreams is located, applicants must make a cash equity contribution equal to 50 per cent of the amount of the loan they receive.

Before opening Beaded Dreams, Wabanonik toured the powwow trail, spending 45 out of 50 weekends a year travelling to powwows in Quebec, Ontario and the United States. She also held administrative posts with the federal government and sees her shop as a welcome escape from that daily grind.

"I like to have my own business," Wabanonik says. "I'm not a government-type person, nine-to-five routine all that time."

The three-month-old business, located on Ottawa's Bank Street, gets plenty of support from the capital's Native community. About 60 per cent of store customers are Aboriginal, Wabanonik estimates.

Donna Quackenbush, a family support worker with the Ottawa Native Friendship Centre, said their staff was very excited to have a Native craft store so close by, especially since such supplies are hard to find. Now friendship centre staff refer people looking for craft supplies to Beaded Dreams.

"We had them provide all the supplies for our children's Community Day. We made bracelets," said Quackenbush, who organizes family and community craft classes as part of her job.

"We think it's terrific that a Native craft store is trying to start a business in Ottawa, and they're supplying what is difficult to find elsewhere."

Wabanonik would eventually like to have the store showcase Native-made items from across North America.

"It doesn't matter what tribe, we're all one Nation," she said. "I'd like to have unusual things, something outstanding, something that you don't see anywhere. Anything that pleases the tourist."

But Wabanonik sighs that it is one day at a time - she's still working on souvenirs.

"I'm still trying to come up with something that says Ottawa on it."