They used to say, “You ought to be in movies.”
In today”™s world, leave the movies to TomKat and LiLo: You should be in movie posters.
The Samuel Owen Gallery in Stamford is growing with the likes of poster restoration and photography services, developing a business model that would be considered off-the-hook at traditional galleries.
“I”™ve been doing restoration for about 15 years now,” said Lee Milazzo, co-owner and founder of Samuel Owen Gallery in Stamford. “I started it Brooklyn while working in a gallery in SoHo when I was in art school at Parsons School of Design.”
Milazzo dropped out of Parsons and worked at the gallery full time, developing methods in the restoration of vintage posters. He would eventually stamp the business as his own as Poster Restoration Inc.
“All they told you in art school was you were going to leave with a student loan and no job,” said Milazzo. “We set up a studio in Brooklyn and gave it a shot to see if there was money to be made there. After a year we realized there was.”
Milazzo, who grew up in Fairfield, brought the business to Stamford. He was helped to find his first space through childhood friend and international musical artist Moby, whose artistic dabbling can be found in the Samuel Owen collection.
“That”™s when it really took off,” said Milazzo of the Stamford move.
Posters restored by the gallery can cost hundreds to thousands of dollars and can date back to the turn of the century. Milazzo also allows for a limited number of artists to house their prints with the gallery.
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Five years ago, Milazzo moved across the street to the current location, allowing for the poster restoration business to grow into a gallery and framing business and the Samuel Owen Gallery, named for their two boys, was born. This year the business has grown once more.
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“We did really well here with the retail but we wanted to grow,” said Milazzo. “We found that once we tried to find customers they couldn”™t find us easily. So we moved the framing business over to The Antique and Artisan Center on Jefferson. The center didn”™t have anything like that, a business within a business, and they had the space for it. It”™s similar to the indoor markets in the city.”
Milazzo said the location has more than tripled Samuel Owens framing business. Nancy Meckel runs the Samuel Owen retail framing business at the center.
“We”™re right in front of every decorator in the area,” said Milazzo. “We now have people who say they never knew our area existed and it was so frustrating because we”™re only three blocks away. Nancy”™s the one who is there and the one you”™ll deal with, she”™s extremely knowledgeable.”
Milazzo said when first coming to the area there was not much development in the area, but with the BLT Harbor Point project rising in front of their windows he is excited for the future of the area.
The space vacated in the Samuel Owen Gallery by the move of the framing portion has not been left idle. Milazzo quickly moved to use the space to grow another segment of the growing symbiotic business: photography. Samuel Owen now has a full photography segment headed up by Katie Farro.
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“For the photography we don”™t have a studio,” said Farro.
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Instead Samuel Owen travels with a mobile set and began the photography side of the business by holding events at area clubs like The Greenwich Water Club.
“We can show clubs that members respond to what we can offer and that has proven to be a great strategy,” said Farro.
Farro, before coming to Samuel Owen, ran her own photography business in Stamford for 15 years.
“These events have been great for us and people began calling to set appointments almost immediately,” said Farro. “As a niche we do family and child photo shoots.”
Milazzo said the photo business will focus on families and children, specializing in black-and-white photography, most often in nonportrait settings.
Farro said working at the gallery has created a strong relationship by working with the Samuel Owen printer and framing.
Farro said the photography business has been slow to build, but has been building nonetheless.
Milazzo said that through his businesses he has found that having a simple channel of professionals that a customer can deal with is key to quality and customer retention.
“We, without really planning to, rely on very few outside vendors,” said Milazzo. “They want to talk to the same person throughout the whole experience. If you”™re talking to us about framing you”™re talking to Nancy, if you”™re talking to us about photography you”™re talking to Katie. With the restoration business it”™s worldwide and they don”™t know what size the space is but it”™s just important what the voice is on the other side of the phone.”
