Woman moves from unemployed to business owner in a few months
Layoff allowed long-held dream space to take root
Standing in her new art gallery, The Dooryard Gallery, Dorothy Nowack is surrounded by two of her loves: art and nature.
There will be kinks in the day-to-day operations to work out, she knows, but she has big plans for the future. Maybe an art festival that will bolster Elm Grove as a cultural destination, she speculates.
Just a year ago, Nowack's dream of owning her own gallery was simmering on the backburner of her mind - even though she'd already taken steps to educate herself about art and nature.
But losing another of her loves, her job as fine arts outreach manager at Wisconsin Lutheran College, turned up the heat. A serendipitous opportunity to obtain a storefront brought the dream into reality.
'Tuck and roll'
Nowack, like so many others these days, lost her job as a result of economy-inspired budget cuts.
She got the news in February but finished up the semester.
"Because there was so much work to be done, I really couldn't lose any of my concentration or spend any time licking my wounds," Nowack said. "I really just had to tuck and roll."
As fine arts outreach manager, she managed the college's choir and concert band tours, and handled recruiting and marketing duties. Before her days of unemployment began, she still had to orchestrate a two-week European tour for 68 students and their families, and an honors band festival for 125 high school students. She had worked at the college since 1995.
Her last day was June 30, and was accompanied by a big question: What now?
After a fruitless summer job search, the answer came to her from her own past.
"I've always been interested in botanical illustration, landscape and garden design, and just everything that is beautiful about flora and the trees, the bark, the shrubs, the flowers," she said.
She already had a degree in horticulture, which she earned after going back to school in 2005 in an effort to gain scientific knowledge about her passion, a degree in art and the master gardener distinction bestowed by the University of Wisconsin-Extension program.
"I knew somehow there must be the potential for all of that to fit together, so the concept started to come together for The Dooryard Gallery," she said of her plan's beginnings in 2005.
Move brings opportunity
But the idea wasn't acted upon until Nowack and her husband, Jim, decided to sell their Milwaukee home and move to Elm Grove in September.
Their Realtor was Tom Kurtz, who also has a stake in the Park 'n Shop stores.
The Nowacks noticed the empty space between the Verizon store and Mystic Ireland during the transaction, and Dorothy inquired about the cost of rent.
After discussing and mulling it over, the couple determined they had just enough capital left over from selling their house to start The Dooryard Gallery.
"Given that the idea had been cooking for so long, the space presented itself, we had the capital, I had no other obligations - everything seemed to just be unrolling right in front of us," she said.
The lease was signed in October. The Nowacks rolled up their sleeves and transformed the space in time for a Dec. 1 opening.
Gallery now open
The Dooryard Gallery is a thematic art gallery featuring nature-inspired art, fine craft and garden accents.
"By making the gallery thematic - regardless of the style, the medium - everything in the gallery would read like a group show, and I really do think that has been achieved," Nowack said. "Everything seems to integrate so well."
Nowack also praised the artists - local, Wisconsin and Midwestern - who agreed to sell their work on a consignment basis at the gallery.
She's looking ahead, too. Nowack hopes eventually to host exhibits and design art shows, perhaps focusing on a particular artist or theme. And of course, there's that dream of an art festival in the village.
It may have been a rocky road to get to this point, but the idea to merge her diverse background has finally been realized with the help of her silent partner in the business, husband, Jim, and the artists willing to take a chance.
"It was a nice bookend to some wild and woolly adventures between February and October … quite unexpected, but such a blessing," she said.
Check it out
WHAT: The Dooryard Gallery
WHEN: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday to Thursday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Friday and Saturday
WHERE: 13425 Watertown Plank Road
CONTACT: (262) 780-8778
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