Remote Control: Shop Local

Remote Control is the weekly blog for Oklahoma Today fall intern Abigail Hall. Check back each week as she discusses her work-from-home experience.

Week 1 Remote Control: Adapting

Week 2 Remote Control: The New Normal

Week 3 Remote Control: Check It Out

Week 4 Remote Control: Creating Usefulness

Week 5 Remote Control: Fair Not

Week 6 Remote Control: National American Indian Heritage Month

Week 7 Remote Control: I'm Dreaming Of A Safe Christmas

Week 8 Remote Control: Christmas Crafting

Happy Holidays Oklahoma! ‘Tis the season to be jolly—and buy a lot of presents for the various people in your life. Whether you’re preparing to gather around the Christmas Tree, Menorah, or Kinara, you’re probably looking for unique items for your loved ones. And with Shop Local Saturday freshly behind us, you might be wanting to keep your gifts local in order to support your neighbors and other local Oklahoman businesses.

Whether you’re looking for candles, books, jewelry, or other apparel. We’ve got you covered. In the spirit of shopping local, here’s a local shop guide with six unique, Oklahoma-based shops with diverse representations in ownership to try out this season:

In the Air Candles & Scents is a local, online, small-batch candle shop based in Broken Arrow.

Broken Arrow’s ITA Candles & Scents, a local Black woman-owned shop, offers hand-poured 100 percent natural, soy wax scented candles and wax melts made in small batches.

If you’re looking for naturally sourced, yet seasonal scents, look no further. In the Air specializes in celebrating Fall all year long using unconventional, yet homey and natural scents like the clove, nutmeg, and cardamom blend poured on top of a dark rum, butter, and tonka bean base in the Something Delightful candle.

Other popular products are ITA’s wax melts, like the Something Jolly melts made from Coconut milk infused with peppermint, with base notes of chocolate and vanilla. In the mood for baking warmth or floral scents? Try the Something Currant-ly candle, made from saffron, apple, black currant, and vanilla bean with a base of anise, patchouli, and amber.

In the Air is offering 10 percent off its Anniversary Collection, is online only and offers next-day shipping. intheaircandles@gmail.com or itacandles.com.

Tulsa’s Fulton Street Books & Coffee is on a mission to increase intergenerational literacy, particularly for people of color and marginalized communities. At least 70 percent of Fulton Street’s books are written by or featuring black, brown, indigenous, and people of color communities in order to promote representation and increase literacy within those communities. The bookstore specializes in craft coffee as well as books, offering drinks like Ube Milk Tea, London Fog, and Coconut Coffee, as well as classics like lattes and espressos.

In addition to featured books from diverse authors, the shop offers book collections and a monthly subscription for younger readers. For collections, try the Black Women are Lit collection, a canon of literature from Black women authors such as Audre Lorde and Billie Holiday. If you have little ones, check out Little & Lit, the monthly subscription service, delivers a diverse selection of two children’s books monthly to subscribers.

Fulton Books products can be purchased online, or at its storefront location at 210 West Latimer Street in Tulsa. (918) 932-8646 or fultonstreet918.com.

Oklahoma City’s Local Lather Laboratory & Soap Shop is everything its name alludes to. The local laboratory makes skin care products from responsibly harvested ingredients that are ethical and safe for the planet, avoiding micro plastics and using sustainably harvested palm oil and glitter made from eucalyptus fibers. The shop boasts 95 percent of its products are low and zero waste.

Shop for unique and brightly colored bar soap, lotion bars, milk bath powder, candles, bath and shower salt shakers, facial cleansing bars and facial oil, and more. Local Lather’s bar soaps come in countless bright colors from essential oils like the Hippie Lover bar soap, a striped tri-color five-ounce bar made from blood orange and patchouli, or the Eucalyptus and Spearmint bar, a bright green swirl of color. The bars are vegan, cruelty-free, alcohol-free, and paraben-free.

The shop offers refills by mail for its bath and shower shakers and powdered milk bath products. You can shop online with free shipping on orders over $75, or curbside pick-up at its Nichols Hill’s location at 4209 North Western Avenue. (917) 605-8027 or locallatherok.com.

At Our Favorite Place in Eufala, customers can shop for sweet treats, wonderful wearables, or local art—something for every taste.

Eufaula’s Our Favorite Place, a woman-owned art gallery and creative collective shop for Oklahoma crafters and entrepreneurs to display and sell their work. The shop sees over two million visitors each year and displays the work of more than 100 artists, vendors, authors, and photographers.

Shop online or in-shop from hundreds of products like 3 Sisters Products Pepper Jelly, which comes in mango pineapple habanero or pineapple jalapeno, or Nancy Williford from Atoka’s macrame bracelets or lampwork earrings. For in-store shopping visit 127 North Main Street in Eufaula. (918) 689-1515 or ourfavoriteplace.com.

In Guthrie, Sealed with a Kiss has all the yarn you need to make your own gifts and quite a few pre-made items as well. Pictured here are an iNoah holiday top. Vendula of London handbag, MadTosh yarn advent calendar, and Rowan yarn.

For all things yarn and knitted, Guthrie’s woman-owned Sealed with a Kiss offers everything under the sun. Established as a pattern design company, the shop now boasts itself as Oklahoma’s premiere yarn shop due to its legendary service, technical knowledge, and diverse selection of yarns that attracts knitting and crochet shoppers from across the globe.

The shop sells premiere yarn from companies like Baah Yarn, Blue Sky Fibers, DanDoh, and Wool Addicts, as well as how-to kits, needles and hooks, patterns, embellishments, fashion, and more.

For a holiday how-to gift, try the shop’s beginner kits with how-to instructions and supplies that will teach you to knit or crochet various items. The Beginner Box No. 1 A offers a tutorial for knitting or crocheting scarves.

Shop online or in shop at 109 East Oklahoma Avenue in Guthrie. (405) 282-8649 or swakknit.com.

December's Thankful Gypsy Box has already gone out, but January boxes are available for order now.

Duncan’s Thankful Gypsy is an online-only apparel shop that began as a family business with owner Makenzy’s mother and grandmother. “There’s nothing better than making someone else feel cute and good in their clothes,” Makenzy says on her website, where she carries sizes small to extra large for adult women, and occasionally children’s and plus-size items, as well as shoes and accessories.

Thankful Gypsy offers monthly boxes with items ranging from clothes, shoes, candles, water bottles, socks, and more. Shop online for unique apparel items like the It’s All Gravy Baby top or Essential Oil Spiced Pumpkin Mix potpourri jars. (580) 656-0522 or thankful-gypsy.myshopify.com.

As always, if you have tips, want to share if this guide was helpful, or just want to let me know which items on this list you loved, send me a line at abigail.hall@travelok.com.

Written By

Abigail Hall

Abigail Hall is Oklahoma Today's fall editorial intern.