It was a beautiful cold day when I ventured into the Communipaw Ave area to meet the owner of Luna De Papel. To no surprise, the area is drastically different from my memories as a child visiting my grandmother on Johnston Avenue. With more homes being built and unique shops opening up, Communipaw is definitely an understated area. It was amazing to see the warm, brightly lit, comforting shop of Luna De Papel, nestled right in-between the old and new, and meeting Marcello and Ruth was such a treat to see that there are beautiful, passionate people in our ever changing Jersey City.

 

What are your names?

Ruth: My name is Ruth Salas.

Marcello: And I’m Marcello Salas, husband and wife.

It’s Ruth’s business, it’s her idea, she is the talent behind what we do here. I support on the back end whatever I can.

Ruth: Yeah, like when I can’t get the door.

Marcello: Yeah of course, a handy man.

What do you guys do?

Ruth: Here is arts and crafts for kids in the morning, but I want to attract older kids, elementary kids after school with activities that they don’t do. I want to do mosaics with them, make paper from scratch and make greeting cards. I have stamps, die-cut machines.

Marcello: It cuts all types of fabrics and papers in different designs. It’s computerized.

Ruth: When I was little, for me to pass a grade, I had to know how to knit, I had to know embroidery. And now my daughter is eight years old. She doesn’t even know what’s knitting. Now she does, she starts, now she’s knitting. But there are little things that people don’t know how to make, like soaps, something so simple or how to hand stitch. And that’s why, especially when I started thinking about this, I want my girls to know this. I did it. I know ever since I was little, I had to do it to pass my grades. My grandma, she even made the yarn. We’d take the wool out of the sheep and we had to spin by hand, and that’s how we’d start knitting from that wool. And so it’s all the stuff that is forgotten, so I want to try to get older kids into it. I don’t see anything around here that is like this, and I know it’s going to be tough in the beginning because no one knows about it.

Marcello: And it’s all about marketing, too, in this area. We’re getting a dumpling store, we have the Grind Coffee Shop and Sam AM is opening up a store.

Ruth: Yeah, so I’m hoping to get better and I want my name to be out there.

Marcello: It’s crafts, it’s DIY. She wants to work with kids, but there’s been a lot of demand from adults asking what are we going to do for them. More and more people are asking, so it’s a big DIY concept.

Ruth: So we’re going to start with maybe Bring Your Own Wine Wednesdays and Fridays at 7 PM for adults.

 

What got you into wanting to make a store?

Ruth: I’ve been working with the school, doing the props. I did the costumes and I don’t do them from scratch, but I buy them and whatever I have to fix, I fix it and personalize it. That’s one of our projects for moms, embellish clothes for your kids. There’s certain stuff you buy that’s so expensive, like in Bloomingdales, which is all embellishment. You can just embellish it yourself. I have so many ideas, I just don’t know how to start.

Marcello:  The other thing that Ruthie is doing herself is taking up her own projects, so things like the frames, the doors. She distressed it since she likes that kind of vintage look. So she’ll buy old stuff like that and give it a vintage look. We’ll bring stuff in and she’ll repurpose it.

Ruth: I want to make this place different. I want to give the kids a different look, like the chandeliers, we looked everywhere for one. I just don’t want it to be something simple. I want a kid to be in a nice environment and I put my mind in everything to decorate this place.  The kids don’t know about vintage, and there were kids here that I showed them an old book and they were amazed at how old the books were. I want them to appreciate things like that.

Marcello: Everyone always compliments her on the energy of this place. They really like it, her tables, they have that live edge going on.

Ruth: Yeah I wanted different, I didn’t want one square table. I look for things and it took me a while.

How did you come up with the name Luna De Papel?

Ruth: What was holding us back was we wanted to come up with a nice name. I thought it’d be easy because my daughters are my everything. So I was going to call it Mick & Camy, and then the colors were going to be pink and purple because my daughters love those colors. But I had to realize that this was going to be for everyone.  After talking and talking with my family we came up with Luna De Papel from “Paper Moon” from Nat King Cole and I was like, “Yup, this is the name. It’s beautiful.”

Marcello: The idea came from the song, but it was also about the energy. The song is about believing in something but using your imagination. You believe it, you can transport yourself. It talks about being under a paper moon, but believing you are actually somewhere beautiful. So the idea is to use your imagination and believe in what you could do.

And you guys said you live in Jersey City?

Marcello: Yea for like 10 years, maybe 12 now. We moved from Brooklyn. We came here right after we got engaged. Both of our families are from Jersey so it made sense, and plus, I already owned a house here.

Ruth: I love Jersey City! We’re just hoping for more good schools.

Is there a favorite Jersey City hangout spot you guys like to go to?

Marcello: We were huge fans of Thirty Acres that left.

Ruth:  We also like Cellar 335

Ruth: Around here, there is nothing yet, but in two months the Dumpling place across the street and then Sam AM will open up.

Marcello: We’re excited for this area to have some good eating spots. We are committed to this area, that’s why we opened up here.

Where can people find your products/website/collaborate?

Marcello: She’s set up her website, but we’ve been kind of “word of mouth.” We’ve tested some things here and there on social media, but in reality, it’s promoting our website and checking out the lineup of classes that she has. She’s has mosaics, string art, paper making, knitting. Those are some key workshops she’s working on right now and decoupage for adults. We should start promoting that soon on our website, like a calendar of events. We are tinkering with what works.

Ruth: I also don’t want to charge a lot. I’m a mom, I have two daughters. I know how much their after school classes are. If I can get some stuff for free, stuff for Argentina that is good quality, but not expensive. Like the wool I want to start spinning, and I’ll get it from Peru since I’m from Peru, and it’s not going to be expensive. I don’t want to be rich out of this, I don’t want to make a lot of money. I just want to help kids and moms to knit for their children. So I really don’t want to charge a lot. Thinking as a mother, I want this to be affordable for a family to be able to come in here and do something that they can be proud of.

I truly cannot wait to see these two do amazing things for our community. Their kindness and warmth is embodied in their shop and you will feel like one of the family. Be sure to follow them on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram!

Check out Luna De Papel at 321 Communipaw Ave. Call at (201)-946-9400 and check out their website.