I'll grant you that "neesh" is more mellifluous. But I have a vendetta against that pronunciation because my ex-husband said the word that way and we used to argue about it (I know: we also argued about thumbprints on the medicine-cabinet mirror). "Nitch," I'll have you know, is the Webster's preferred pronunciation, and when I ask Gina, the business manager, how the store pronounces it, she says, "Nitch." (See?) I wonder: "Do you ever hear people saying it the other way?" and she says, "Allll the time." I ask, "Does it ever bother you?" She says, "Mm, no, we're used to it." Thereby proving anecdotally that they are more highly evolved than I am. As if the visual evidence weren't enough.
I mean, LOOK.
This is the scene that greets you when you walk into Madison's Niche. Don't you love it? And secretly want to say, "I'll take that whole display and you don't even have to wrap it because it's all for me"? It'll probably look different when you go, not just because I will have bought the whole display but because, as Gina explains, they receive new merchandise "every single day," and while the store managers and visual director, Danielle, are in charge of where to put items, they all work on it together: "It's a daily thing." (They offer many American-made items, so their supply hasn't been affected by covid delays.)
Gina and Corinne, arrangement artists/customer-happiness agents extraordinaire.
As you can see from the creative, compelling displays, Madison's Niche offers "a little bit of everything," including clothing for women and babies, accessories, home decor, and gift ideas for all (Reed and I almost always find his teacher gifts here, so he knows to bring Dad when it's time to shop for Mom).
Pairing the soft blue of pussy willow with faded denim: genius.
I'm admittedly a sucker for anything with words on it, but their selection is both aesthetically pleasing and inspirational.
In case you were curious (I was), Madison is in fact a real person: the daughter of owner Karen McAvoy. There are four locations of Madison's Niche--Stony Brook, Sayville, and Garden City in addition to our very own--and while I've only been to the one store and I'm sure they're all divine, I can say with authority that there is just one Huntington. You know what to do.
