Polly Claire’s offers 27 loose-leaf teas imported from London. (Contributed photo)Business name: Polly Claire’s
Namesake: Owner Rashelle Stafford named the tearoom after her daughters, Polly and Claire. The girls, now 17 and 18, work as servers there on Saturdays, often hosting etiquette lessons and corporate talks for visiting groups. Their brothers, Lance and Grant, also lend a helping hand and can occasionally be found in the kitchen washing dishes. “And those poor guys don’t even have a sandwich named after them,” Stafford quipped.
Date opened: September 2016, years after a two-year stay in London imbued Stafford and her daughters with a love for afternoon tea. “We just decided to take the tea parties that we had around our dining room table and expand it a little bit,” the mother said.
Located in: The historic Dent House at 6178 Adamson Circle. Built by railroad contractor Jarrett Dent in 1854, the Bonny Oaks icon is the last standing plantation home in Chattanooga. Over the last 163 years, the building has served as a bed-and-breakfast, a wedding venue and an extension for nearby Chattanooga Church, from which Stafford bought the home. Despite its many reincarnations, the facility is still best remembered for its 90-year stead as the Bonny Oaks Children’s Home.
Aesthetics: After purchasing the historic locale, renovators worked hard to return it to its former glory. They put in marble flooring and a grand foyer, and they installed chandeliers and windows that matched the 1850s time period. Still, the team was careful to keep everything that was original to the house intact, meaning guests can walk on the original hardwood floors, examine the hand-hewn fireplaces and see the waves in the hand-blown windows left untouched over the last century.