By Mallory Taylor, Staff writer 

When you walk in, you notice the clothes, candles and carefully chosen gifts. But before you take in any of that, you notice the smell. Maybe it’s pumpkin or lavender.  

Whatever the scent, it’s one of the first things that stays with you. It fills the room quietly, creating an atmosphere that feels separate from the busy streets outside. 

This is Peach and Palm, a downtown Valdosta boutique where fashion, fragrance and craftsmanship come together. What began as conversations between two neighbors over wine has grown into a space shaped by the belief that the things we create can become part of the memories people take with them. 

For owners Kassandra Hasenauer and Jill Clark, Peach and Palm is not simply a place to purchase another product. Rather, it is an experience thoughtfully developed through curation and intention. The boutique combines clothing and gifts with a candle-pouring bar, allowing customers to bounce between consumption and creation. 

In a world increasingly dominated by mass production and fast fashion, the shop offers something more tactile: the opportunity to slow down, make something with your own hands and leave with an object that has the presence of when you made it. The memory may slowly rust, but the feeling of being there with someone can linger in what you made together. 

The origin of Peach and Palm began with Hasenauer and Clark living in the same neighborhood, and their sons being friends. Their friendship grew naturally, eventually turning into discussions about the businesses and experiences they wished existed in Valdosta.  

The idea was not entirely foreign to either woman. Hasenauer already had experience creating businesses around experiences she felt were missing from her own life. In Valdosta, Georgia, she owns The Southern Cellar, a wine bar, Gūd Coffee, a specialty coffee shop, and co-owns Oak & Olive, a cocktail bar.  

Before opening The Southern Cellar, Hasenauer said she was looking for a place where she and her husband could enjoy wine and spend time together, but she could not find exactly what she wanted. 

“Then we just started talking about ideas over wine, which is how the best ideas are born, of course,” Hasenauer said.  

That same philosophy along the way found its way into Peach and Palm. Clark, whom Hasenauer affectionately calls the “candle queen,” had already established two candle businesses and brought an intimate knowledge of fragrance and candle-making to their partnership. She wanted to introduce a candle-pouring bar to Valdosta, something that could function as both a creative outlet and a social experience. 

“We didn’t have what we wanted, so we created it,” Hasenauer said. 

Rather than waiting for an experience to appear, the owners have made one themselves. The candle-pouring process gives that philosophy a physical form. Customers are not merely selecting a candle from a shelf; they are participating in its creation.  

They choose scents, pour the wax, and leave with something that did not exist before they entered the store. The result is both tangible and ephemeral—a candle that eventually burns away, but whose scent can preserve the memory of the moment in which it was created. 

For Hasenauer, that connection between fragrance and memory is central to what she hopes Peach and Palm becomes for the community. A candle can be made during a night with friends, a date, a family outing or another occasion that deserves to be remembered. 

“You get to take it home, and every time you smell it, or burn it, you remember that fun experience,” Hasenauer said. 

There is something almost ritualistic about that process. In an era when convenience often means immediacy, handcrafting requires the opposite. It asks for patience, attention and participation. The finished object becomes more meaningful because the customer had a hand in producing it. 

That philosophy also creates a contrast with the fast-fashion culture that surrounds much of modern retail. While trends can appear and disappear almost overnight, Peach and Palm takes a more deliberate approach to what enters its space. Hasenauer said she and Clark gravitate toward neutrals, clean lines, black and white, creating an aesthetic that feels uncomplicated without being accidental. 

“I have a very similar vision to what we like as far as clean lines, very simple, just easy to digest,” Hasenauer said. 

The simplicity of the store is part of its curation. Hasenauer said she considers every product that enters the shop, from clothing to accessories, with the intention of creating an everyday boutique rather than a space overcrowded with trends. 

She hopes customers eventually associate Peach and Palm with dependable staples—a good pair of jeans, a dress, a tracksuit or a bag—while still finding something unexpected each time they visit. 

That intentionality made Hasenauer wonder how Valdosta customers would respond. Looking around the shop, she noticed there was not a single pattern in the store and questioned whether the absence of bold prints might work against them. Instead, customers seemed drawn to the restraint. 

“Valdosta shows up and surprises me that they’re really open minded to new ideas,” Hasenauer said. 

That willingness to experiment has become something Hasenauer has noticed across her businesses. She said she has learned that customer habits are not always as predictable as they seem. What she expects to sell is not necessarily what customers gravitate toward, and products she initially questions can sometimes become the ones people embrace. 

Rather than seeing that unpredictability as a problem, Hasenauer has incorporated it into the way she approaches business. She wants Peach and Palm to remain in motion, with new products and scents periodically entering the shop so that there is always something unfamiliar waiting among the familiar. 

“I always want a new product and something to be excited about,” Hasenauer said. 

Even the scents she personally gravitates toward reveal the range of personalities that fragrance can possess. Hasenauer’s favorite is Indian Ember, a woodsy scent with tobacco notes that she describes as more masculine. For an everyday fragrance, she prefers Date Night, while Hocus Pocus occupies her seasonal rotation because it evokes Halloween without becoming overwhelmingly pumpkin-scented. 

The variety allows customers to create something that feels distinctly their own. One person may gravitate toward something warm and woodsy, while another may choose something clean or seasonal. The candle becomes an extension of personal taste, but also of memory. 

Beyond the current storefront, Hasenauer and Clark have ambitions to expand Peach and Palm into other cities and strengthen their online presence. They are also working toward local delivery for customers within approximately 15 miles of the store. 

Yet the foundation of the business remains surprisingly simple. Two neighbors became friends. Conversations became ideas. Ideas became a storefront. And that storefront became a place where customers can turn an ordinary afternoon into something more deliberate. 

In the end, Peach and Palm is not only selling clothing or candles. It is selling the possibility of association—the idea that a particular scent can make you rewind back to a night with friends, a date, a family afternoon or a moment when they made something with their own hands. 

The candle may eventually burn out, and the clothes may eventually leave the closet, but the memory attached to them lingers. That is the alchemy at the heart of Peach and Palm: taking something as fleeting as fragrance and transforming it into something that can stay with you.