Jillian Harris was the guest of honour during a colourful Garden Party at Guildford Town Centre on Sunday, May 4.
The Alberta-born TV personality, best known for appearances on The Bachelor, The Bachelorette and Love It or List It Vancouver, is promoting a new line of Smash + Tess clothing at a "pop-up" in the Surrey shopping mall.
The $10-a-ticket launch party was held prior to public sales of the Garden Party collection from the Vancouver-based company, launched in 2016 by mother-daughter duo Ashley and Teresa Freeborn, known for direct-to-consumer (D2C) sales.
Temporarily located in the mall's Centre Court area, the lavender-hued Smash + Tess pop-up has fitting rooms and a lounge-like look and feel.
"The brand is very much a D2C brand for the most part," Freeborn said on April 16, "but I think interacting with the clothes and being able to feel the quality and just interact with people, because so much of our brand is about community-building, it's kind of exciting to extend that into the real world."
Asked if Smash + Tess would consider opening a store at Guildford, Freeborn said it's not outside the realm of possibilities.
"I think that we've been hesitant with pandemic and post-pandemic swings, back and forth, but now I think brick-and-mortar is really coming back to life, which is exciting," she said.
"We do like to test these areas, you know, like, is this something that the local community wants? In the Surrey area we do have a lot of customers, so I'm excited to test this and see what they think."
