Behind a blue ombre curtain in Boone’s Fly Shop sits a new Asian market. Decorated with handmade Asian art and colorful hanging paper lanterns, the market is home to shelves stocked with Kewpie mayo, ramen and other ingredients and snacks central to Asian culture.
The two Asian American Pacific Islander women who own and manage the Happy Persimmon offer a selection of staple foods and a gathering space for Boone’s community. The market is open every Wednesday through Saturday.
Opening its curtain on Nov. 1, The Happy Persimmon is owned by friends Kim Short and Ilya Wang, who saw a need for a market that provided access to Asian ingredients in Boone.
“We struggled because we all had to go down the mountain to get any Asian ingredients,” Short said. “Ilya was studying in Argentina on her Fulbright scholarship and was sad to leave the great Asian markets available there. I said, ‘Well what if we open one?’ and that was the beginning of this.”
After several months of zeroing in on suppliers, hosting trial pop-ups and taking a couple of business classes, Short said they were ready to soft launch the business.
“Living in a town that is predominantly white, it is hard being of Asian background and feeling like there’s not a place for me here,” Wang said. “Food is so central to our culture and not having access to that has been the missing piece.”
Mai Nguyen, the president of the Asian Student Association, said she was excited when The Happy Persimmon reached out to ASA about the opening.
“It’s an opportunity for people to grow and try different tastes and flavors,” Nguyen said. “Our diversity here is really, really small, I think with more Asian businesses more people will come here because they will have access to those ingredients.”
Short and Wang first met while working at FARM Cafe together in Boone, where they were able to spark a friendship that led to the beginning of The Happy Persimmon.
Renee Boughman, the director of Community Engagement at FARM, said she knew the two were more than capable of opening the market.
“I knew both of them were perfect for this with their friendship and professionalism together,” Boughman said. “My experience in the restaurant business is that almost everybody enjoys Asian cuisine on some level, and the key is to introduce people to things and educate them about it.”
The market prioritizes sustainability and features East Asian food, specifically Taiwanese and Japanese cuisine, but also includes Korean, Vietnamese, Thai, Filipino and Indian ingredients.
“We’re working with local farmers and selling produce that’s locally sourced and looking at the food system here and how the two can blend together,” Wang said.
By blending locally sourced produce with East and Southeast Asian staples, Wang and Short aim to build a market that bridges cultures and supports the community.
“Every step of the way it’s been community, community, community and that’s our goal for this place,” Short said.
Along a wall in the shop hangs a bulletin board where customers can suggest items they’d like to see, and Wang and Short said they strive to stock them when possible.
Eventually, the duo hopes to host cooking classes and tea demonstrations as a hands-on way to share recipes and deepen cultural connections through Asian cuisine.
“It’s been so empowering feeling like I can take up space and be an effective communicator and business person not just as a woman but a woman of Asian descent,” Wang said. “Feeling really empowered in these identities that used to make me feel disempowered.”
The duo’s pride in embracing their identities is woven into every shop detail, where every corner tells a story from handmade fabric art to wooden shelves that have been passed down generations.
“There’s a lot of little things about the shop that I think are really magical and hold so much history of this place and of our community,” Wang said.