About Hollie
Crow Corner Primitives has been in business since 1999, though Hollie Colton, a native of Adel, Iowa has been “crafting” with her mother, Phyllis Wicks, for over 20 years. Together they have held an annual fall craft open house in Adel for the past 23 years and have recently started having a “Garden Party Gathering” in late spring/early summer. After retirement, her father, LeRoy, joined in the mix, and together they started creating handcrafted, primitive, pine furniture we’ve dubbed “finished primitive”, and Raccoon River Rustics was also born.
After working in the business field for a number of years, Hollie, along with a partner, opened a small retail store in Lexington, Missouri and Crow Corner was born. The shop featured Hollie’s own custom shaker-style furniture and smaller home accents, along with candle lines and also featured crafts from other area artisans. Running the store and filling orders definitely kept her busy, but she loved meeting new people every day and enjoyed talking with the “regulars”. Upon relocating with her husband, Paul, to Joplin, Missouri in the fall of 2001, she has sold mainly to wholesale customers in the 4-state area, along with a few customers in Iowa as well. Though Hollie misses having her own store, she now has more time for “creating” new items, which she loves, however she still does a few antique/craft shows in Missouri and Iowa.
With a background in art and a flair for decorating, along with a talent for “working with wood” (she says she got THAT from her grandfather), Hollie designs and builds all the items herself, furniture and all. She takes great pride in the fact that she can “hang with the guys” when it comes to working with power tools and has a workshop that most guys would envy! She still builds furniture, but has really found a niche with her rustic signs, designing and hand-cutting many of the stencils herself, so she’s constantly looking for new sayings she can design into signs. Hollie works on batches of 40-120 signs at a time so her workshop is always filled with “works in progress” and she wouldn’t have it any other way!
