- Gather & Learn
We believe you’re only as good as the people you surround yourself with. Over the years, Ellwood’s has connected with many local shops and organizations that share our core values of environmental stewardship, social awareness, community support, and health-conscious living. We love to support locally-owned or minority-owned or BIPOC-owned or female-owned or family-owned vendors and suppliers.
We encourage you to support these friends of Ellwood Thompson’s:
Flourish Travel: Go Explore and Thrive
Flourish Travel specializes in helping people plan their travel to maximize well-being, growth, creativity, and productivity. Travel is key to truly thriving and flourishing in life, and Flourish Travel is here to integrate your physical, mental, and spiritual goals into every trip you take.
Stacy Luks, head of Flourish Travel, is a certified Well-Being Travel Specialist with global experience in adventure travel, wellness and fitness vacations, destination spas, family and group getaways, and retreats of all types. She loves seeing clients return from a trip full of energy and fresh perspectives.
Located on historic Broad Street in the heart of Richmond, Verdalina is a women’s clothing boutique best described by their own tagline: “cool glamour and sustainable style”. They bring organic, high quality clothes to Richmond’s Arts District and shine a spotlight on exclusive designers and independent clothing brands.
Carytown Bicycle Company builds, sells, and repairs bicycles while also stocking high quality bicycle apparel, accessories, and components. They take pride in offering the best experience to every customer they meet and are deeply invested in supporting bicycle culture in the Richmond community.
Shockoe Denim is a family-owned and operated company located in Richmond’s historic Shockoe Bottom. They take pride in the fact that all the raw materials used in their jeans can trace their origins back to a U.S. factory or workshop. When you walk in to their showroom, you’ll find it’s more like an art studio than a traditional retail store. They bring their customers into the entire creative process, allowing them watch their products come to life. Every pair of jeans from Shockoe Denim is handcrafted and truly one of a kind.
Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden’s mission is to enlighten and inspire its visitors through outstanding botanical collections, horticultural displays, and landscape design. They engage people with the natural world through educational programs, resources, and outreach, and constantly advocate for sustainability and stewardship of our planet.
Nestled between The Fan and Richmond’s West End, the Museum District has one of the city’s most significant collections of early 20th century architecture. It became the state’s third largest historic district in 1993 and was later added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1994.
The district features the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the Virginia Historical Society, brick row houses, churches, synagogues, and schools. We support the Museum District Association’s mission, “to unite, protect, and advance the interests of the neighborhood in order to realize its potential and improve the quality of life in the neighborhood and community”, and we value the great work they do to uphold it.
Inspire celebration and spread joy with flowers from Strawberry Fields & Finds. For over 15 years, Strawberry Fields has been a fixture in the Historic Fan District of Richmond, Virginia. They’re a quaint, inviting flower and gift shop that makes you feel like part of the neighborhood. Their goal is to create the most thoughtful, fresh, custom floral arrangements and sell gifts made by talented local artisans. You can find their arrangements and gifts in Ellwood’s.
Banking
We believe in working with organizations that truly serve our community and strengthen our local economy.
That’s why we chose Citizens & Farmers Bank.
C&F Bank has served local families, small businesses, and farmers for over 85 years. By banking locally instead of choosing a national bank, your hard earned dollars get pumped back into your local economy through taxes, payrolls, and purchases. You’re also supporting your neighbors who own and operate the local bank. Be vocal, and keep it local!
Artists
Ed Trask
While decorating the walls of buildings and restaurants in his home city, Richmond, VA, drummer Ed Trask developed a simultaneous reputation as a fine artist. One of the most well known muralists in Richmond, he is now firmly entrenched as a collectible painter, the field in which he received his VCU degree.
His subjects are immersed in surprising colors and vivid energy reflecting highways and byways as though he has just passed through. Recollections of passing pastorial scenes defined by utility poles and street lights, hills and valleys, urban settings and country landscapes take on this drummer's rhythms.
Chris Milk
Chris is a Richmond, Virginia artist and self-taught painter currently living and working in Oregon Hill. He’s helped us at Ellwood Thompson’s by adorning the walls of our Community Room with a wonderful mural. Chris Milk is a talented individual with a unique style that stands out as a mixture of folk, lore, and a bit of whimsy. There is something magical about the feelings his painting inspires.
Neal Iwan
Neal is an illustrator and painter living and working in Richmond. He graduated from VCU in 2006 with a degree in Communication Arts and has been making art for local publications, ad agencies and galleries ever since. Neal Iwan employs elements of cubism, expressionism and surrealism to produce works of art that radiate energy and emotion.
Emily Herr
Emily Herr is a Richmond native who creates murals and other bright work at home and abroad under the name HerrSuite. Her work is illustrative and celebrates delicate chaos.
Resources
Tom Brickman
Tom is a woodworking designer skilled in millwork and carpentry. His craftsmanship can be found throughout Richmond. He was a graduate from VCU's sculpture program in 1987. Tom creates furnishings and decor utilizing recycled, unique, and found materials. One wall surface in The Beet Café is made of recycled wood scraps that include redwood from a demolished water tower and an old pier. The columns and beams in The Beet Café are made of heart pine and were reclaimed from old mills in Virginia, by E.T. Moore.
Hoskins Creek Table Company
Hoskins Creek Table Company** **(located in Warsaw, Virginia) helped us greatly by constructing our Community Gathering Tables. Hoskins Creek was started in Tappahannock in 1994 and is owned and operated by John B. Vaughan III and J. Bracket Vaughan IV, who are father and son. The wood they used to make our tables was reclaimed from old Richmond warehouses and an 1800’s home in Port Royal, Virginia.
E.T. Moore Lumber
The largest supplier of antique and reclaimed vintage heart pine in the country, E.T. Moore Lumber is responsible for the wood in our booth table tops and the adjacent half- wall. They’ve been in business as a local family owned and operated company since 1969 and source their heart pine from old mills and factories. They are America’s only “Heart Pine Specialists” and “guarantee you a brilliant rich patina every time.”
Acorn Sign Graphics
Our outside patio table tops were crafted locally by Acorn Sign Graphics from reclaimed highway signs that were obtained from a local traffic sign supplier. They are here to provide you with premium quality signage and are known for their award-winning design, eco-friendly sign manufacturing, custom fabrication and long-lasting installations. In fact, many of the signs they used for our table tops would have ended up in the landfill.
Cut Cut Creative
Cut Cut Creative is an imaginative printing studio in Richmond, Virginia that is passionate about bringing bold ideas to life. Working with designers, artists, movie producers, galleries and many small businesses, Cut Cut uses a variety of commercial printing methods to create signage, posters, t-shirts, props, stickers, and much more. As artists and designers themselves, the founders of Cut Cut, Julie and Shawn, understand the craftsmanship and quality necessary for custom fabrication projects and are committed to helping all of their clients achieve professional results - regardless of project size or scope.
Organization we look up to
We are members of Civil Eats.
Civil Eats is a daily news source for critical thought about the American food system. We publish stories that shift the conversation around sustainable agriculture in an effort to build economically and socially just communities.
The Cornucopia Institute engages in educational activities supporting the ecological principles and economic wisdom underlying sustainable and organic agriculture. Through research and investigations on agriculture and food issues, The Cornucopia Institute provides needed information to family farmers, consumers, and other stakeholders in the good food movement.
The Environmental Working Group is an American activist group that specializes in research and advocacy in the areas of agricultural subsidies, toxic chemicals, drinking water pollutants, and corporate accountability.
Food Polictics by Marion Nestle
Marion Nestle is Paulette Goddard Professor, of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, Emerita, at New York University, which she chaired from 1988-2003 and from which she officially retired in September 2017. She is also Visiting Professor of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell. She earned a Ph.D. in molecular biology and an M.P.H. in public health nutrition from the University of California, Berkeley, and has been awarded honorary degrees from Transylvania University in Kentucky (2012) and from the City University of New York’s Macaulay Honors College (2016).
Local Futures is a non-profit organization whose purpose is to raise awareness about what it identifies as the root causes of contemporary social, environmental, and economic crises.
The Non-GMO Project is a mission-driven nonprofit organization dedicated to building and protecting a non-GMO food supply. They do this through consumer education and outreach programs; marketing support provided to Non-GMO Project Verified brands; and training resources and merchandising materials provided to retailers.
OCA is an online and grassroots 501(c)3 nonprofit public interest organization, and the only organization in the U.S. focused exclusively on promoting the views and interests of the nation's estimated 50 million consumers of organically and socially responsibly produced food and other products.
Slow Food RVa is a non-profit, all-volunteer organization which works collaboratively to champion the local foods of central Virginia and their sources, producers and historical traditions. We welcome volunteers of all ages, skills and backgrounds to join us in developing and staging our programs.
Southern Environmental Law Center
Their mission is to protect the basic right to clean air, clean water, and a livable climate; to preserve our region’s natural treasures and rich biodiversity; and to provide a healthy environment for all.
