Photo by Erin Nelson.
Lynn Ritchie, owner of A’Mano, arranges items on a table in her shop in Lane Parke’s phase 1 development in Mountain Brook Village in April 2021.
Lynn Ritchie’s background is in finance, but she could tell early on in her career that her heart was somewhere else.
“I got an MBA at Vanderbilt and started working in banking, but I was a docent at the art museum on the weekends,” she said. “I truly loved that and loved going to galleries.”
She dreamed of opening her own store, and her husband, Alan — a “serial entrepreneur,” Ritchie said — encouraged her to stop talking about it and do it.
So she did, and now she’s celebrating the decision she made 25 years ago to open A’mano, a gallery and shop featuring curated items that are handmade, one-of-a-kind or exhibit great design.
“I never dreamed I would be around for 25 years, but the community has been so encouraging and welcoming, and we’ve tried to provide what they like,” Ritchie said. “It’s been a fun adventure; I love to travel and find things.”
She said at the beginning, A’mano — which means “by hand” — carried a lot of handmade items from Mexico.
“I used to travel to Guadalajara and come back with a container, and we would go through it with a Spanish dictionary figuring out what was what,” she said.
Not long after that, she added furniture handmade by a group in Texas. That was in the first year, when the gallery was in Crestline Village.
But when she moved to Mountain Brook Village, she “brought in more gifts and jewelry and became a little more sophisticated.”
There have been more changes since then, Ritchie said. Though the passion behind A’mano hasn’t changed, its look has evolved over the years. When Ritchie moved the shop to Lane Parke six years ago — the first store to open there — A’mano got another makeover and went through a rebrand.
Ritchie adopted a new motto that fit the store’s shopping experience — “Considered objects for an artful life.”
“When we were building at Lane Parke, I knew I wanted to do more. It’s been fun and worked really well,” Ritchie said. “Now we do a great job with coffee table books, nice glassware and that kind of thing, and our wedding registry has really taken off. We try to bring in things that are special, that aren’t in other stores.”
For all of her inventory, “it’s always a process — I’m always looking,” she said. “I want everything that goes out the door to be something we’re proud of.”
A’mano’s online sales have really taken off in recent years too, Ritchie said.
“Part of our success is the team we have. We have the most wonderful group of people who work here, who love A’mano and are so dedicated,” she said. “We try to bend over backward to get the customer what they want, and we have some loyal customers we love who have become friends.”
Ritchie said when she looks back to A’mano’s beginnings in 1998, she feels like the past 25 years have gone really fast. But she’s packed a lot into the journey. She’s raised four children — her oldest is also 25 — and had a battle with breast cancer along the way.
“When we started A’mano, I had a baby store and a baby boy, but we made it work,” she said. “We’ve learned how to overcome a crisis.”
Overall, it’s been “a long term dream to have this store and what we sell here,” Ritchie said. “We’re really proud of that.”
A’mano is located in Lane Parke at 281 Rele St.
For more information, visit amanogifts.com.
