Boulevard Home Furnishings Opens in Cedar City, Utah

Furniture World News Desk on 3/30/2015

Retail strategist Connie Post, chief executive of Affordable Design Solutions, announced that she has created a fresh concept for Boulevard Home Furnishings in Cedar City, Utah. The new store design pays homage to the town’s past and celebrates its cultural vitality.

The owners of the new retail location—the fourth in their regional chain anchored by a 120,000-square-foot flagship store in St. George, Utah—sought out Post’s expertise when they decided to build a store from the ground up. After her inventive transformation of their St. George showroom in 2011, they realized her understanding of the Boulevard concept would ensure the continuity of the brand, but also bring a fresh, regional twist unique to Cedar City.

“Our St. George store has a nostalgic, Old West feel, like you’re in a town square,” says Boulevard Home Furnishings CEO Sheldon Wittwer, whose relative, founder Lester Wittwer, originated the first store in 1974. “For this smaller location, we wanted a similar feel.”

According to Post, the “Boulevard” name is at the core of its brand experience. “Their stores all have a central thoroughfare, or boulevard, reminiscent of Main Street in a small town,” she explains. The retail strategist and her team worked closely with Boulevard’s management to adapt their Americana theme to this new 35,000-square-foot Cedar City store. “My goal was to create a shopping experience that the community could identify with,” she explains. Learning how much geography, history and cultural celebrations have helped shape the town, Post decided to integrate elements of all three into her design.

Founded in the mid-1800s as an iron ore mining center, the town wasn’t fully connected with the rest of the country until the 1920s, when the rail line was built. Once the train depot was put in place, the town became a hub. “The entire store is modeled after a train terminal with a big, open main entrance three stories tall,” explains Steve Manwaring, creative director, advertising, for Boulevard Home Furnishings. “Once you enter the store, the guest services desk to the left resembles a ticket booth.” Post also incorporated other railroad elements, including one dramatic display. “We had a large replica of a locomotive custom built. It emerges from a wall as though it’s about to speed through the store,” she adds.

Geographically, Cedar City sits in a valley, surrounded by mountains, in high desert country. The town is close to incredible rock formations that look like a smaller version of Bryce Canyon. Many people retreat to their cabins and vacation homes in the mountains on weekends and for vacations. To bring the informal, rustic ambiance found in these vacation homes into the retail environment, Post introduced lodge-style details. She brought five natural gas fireplaces into the store, including one with an imposing stone façade several stories high, another dramatic “moment” that has a huge impact.



One of Cedar City’s biggest cultural events, the annual Utah Shakespeare Festival, takes place from June 25 through October 31. The retail strategist created an area for displaying elaborate Elizabethan costumes the actors wear during performances, as a way of celebrating the community’s most popular festival. She also created an entrance to the recliner and home theater departments that borrows from the one at Shakespeare’s Globe Theater in London.

This mountain community is also very much a family town and Post created a children’s department that the whole clan could appreciate. To keep kids entertained while parents make buying decisions, Post and her team included experiential activities. When parents shop for furniture for their kids, the little ones are nearby shooting hoops with Nerf balls and drawing on the chalkboard wall.



Post is passionate about bringing natural light into spaces she designs. Since the Cedar City store lacks windows, she integrated a clearstory that runs the length of, and above, the central boulevard. It allows indirect daylight to filter onto the pedestrian walkway that leads shoppers into the heart of the store.

Manwaring sums up why the design works so well for Boulevard’s market. “This community takes a lot of pride in who they are. By tying the store’s theme into its history, Connie has helped make this their store.”