By Hannah Lester
hlester@opelikaobserver.com
The Well is set to open soon in downtown Opelika, creating a space for women to gather, shop, grow their businesses and thrive.
“The general idea of the place is to create a space, a very inclusive, welcoming space, for women to gather,” said Alison Kovak, who owns the building, The Well. “Our desire is for it to be a platform to incubate and launch women-owned businesses.”
Step inside The Well, located at 824 Ave. A, in Opelika, and you’ll find 15 to 20 businesses owned by women in the community, but there is one anchor business, Kovak said, which is The Tea Room.
“Think of it like a market, but everything is curated by women or created by women,” she said.
The Tea Room is located centrally and will serve high-end teas, coffees and adaptogenic lattes.
An adaptogenic latte is essentially a coffee … without the coffee. They are made like a latte without espresso, Kovak said. Instead, they have blended daptogens, e.g. a superfood.
There will be food too, but items that are good for the body.
“So, we’re going to have a nice emphasis on health,” Kovak said.
Outside of the Tea Room are other businesses that are getting their start at The Well.
These businesses may rotate, because the hope, Kovak said, is that as they businesses grow, they will move out of The Well into their own brick-and-mortar spaces.
There are rooms in the space that will accommodate “experiences,” she said.
There’s a room designed for meditation and prayer — everything in the room is white, from the wallpaper to the furniture, for a calming experiencing.
Looking for the exact opposite?
“We created a room called the garden,” Kovak said. “It’s like the night sky, and we’ve got stars blinking on the ceiling and growing trees coming out of the walls and it has swings in it.”
There’s an art gallery, a tea room and more. One day The Well may even incorporate a healthy food market into the concept, she said.
See something you like in the building? Everything is for sale. Everything.
“There’s literally nothing you put your eyes on, not the rug you walk on, not the lights hanging from the ceiling [that’s not] for sale,” Kovak said. “So if you walk in and you resonate with something, you can take it home.”
The Well is open:
Monday: 2 to 7 p.m.
Tuesday to Thursday: 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Friday and Saturday: 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. and
Sunday: 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
This is the first in a series of articles on the different businesses that will be located inside The Well.
The Mission Statement of The Well:
The Well, designed by women to create intentional moments of connection that unlock our design to encourage, uplift and embrace each other. Together we plant, we grow, and we bloom.