COLLEGE friends who reunited to create an online fashion site for women in their 40s have opened a summer pop-up shop in York.

Hannah Roberts and Kari Owers are bringing their online brand Watson & White to Grape Lane until the end of July.

They will be selling fashion and accessories, personally selected by Hannah and Kari, who have been best friends for 20 years after meeting at Newcastle College where they studied fashion and textiles.

Hannah went on to work on retail and buying, before raising her family and running her own craft café, Me & Mrs Fisher in York for several years.

Kari studied fashion design then carved out a 20-year career in public relations; she runs her own creative PR agency in Newcastle.

Now in their 40s with children in their teens and a desire to do something together, they spotted a gap in the market for a lifestyle site and store for women just like them and set up watsonandwhite.com – using their maiden names in the brand name.

Hannah said: “Watson & White is for women who love fashion and have their own style but don’t want to spend a fortune on designer labels. Women who love the high street but want to look different to the crowd. They are inspired by other women and how they can style the same outfit in different ways rather than catwalk trends.

“I always wanted to get back to fashion, and having spoken to many of our friends we realised that a lot of the style advice for women of our age was high end and expensive. We want our ranges to be accessible so have a rule that if we would not buy it or wear it ourselves, we won’t stock it.

“After almost a year selling online, where most of our customers talk to us on Instagram or Facebook, it will be wonderful to actually meet some over the summer and get feedback on Watson & White’s range before we begin to source our Autumn/Winter collection."

The pop up shop will be open Monday to Saturday 10am-5.30pm, Sunday 11am-4pm selling its high summer collection of clothing, jewellery, scarves and handbags alongside a selection of locally produced candles from The York Candle company.