Nuts about art

Stepping into the shop at 19 Baker Ave. there are two distinct displays — to the left are shelves containing bags of roasted nuts, and to the right is a contemporary art gallery, simple with its white walls but covered in works of color and inspiration.

The combination is a little out there, Roy Scruggs acknowledges, but indulge him for a moment.

“They serve the same higher end market, to some extent,” he said. “Everybody that’s come in has just said, ‘this is awesome.’ I’ve been really happy with that.”

Scruggs, 45, recently opened up Big Mountain Nuts, a specialty roasted nuts store, and White Apple Gallery, which features exclusively contemporary artists, in the same space adjacent to 33 Baker Salon.

The gallery will have its grand opening reception on Thursday, May 4 from 6 to 9 p.m. The opening will coincide with the start of the 13th season of Whitefish Gallery Nights. Scruggs says there will be a DJ, butler service and hors d’oeuvre for guests.

“Kind of some different things to highlight that we’re a little different,” he explained.

After calling Whitefish home for 20 years before leaving to go to college, live and work in a variety of places, including the Philippines, Hawaii and Portland, it was Scruggs’s dream to return home and open a gallery.

The gallery, which takes up the majority of the space, features 13 contemporary artists from the Pacific Northwest, nine of those from Montana, showing pieces new to Whitefish. The walls display everything from the recognizable to the very abstract, including sculptures and even a Picasso sketch.

Scruggs’s own work is on display as well. Art has become a serious passion for him in the last several years, having studied in places like Florence and Paris after working as a professor and teacher in various locations.

While Whitefish already has a slew of galleries in town, Scruggs says White Apple brings something different with its uniquely contemporary voices.

“I didn’t realize there were so many contemporary voices in Montana that were so strong, so experienced and so relevant,” he said. “You see a lot of really, really great Western realism in this town, and I think we just bring a different perspective and voice.”

The gallery also offers 12 different discount programs for buyers, like the young collectors discount for people under 41 and the senior program for those over 65. Most discounts range from 10 to 15 percent off.

There’s also a room set aside more frugal collectors in mind, where every piece is an original work under $1,000, created by artists featured in the gallery.

“There are pieces in here that are a couple hundred bucks. You can get a poster downtown for a couple hundred bucks,” Scruggs said. “The goal here is to have art here that’s more affordable.”

The nut shop seems like an offshoot of the gallery idea, offering a similar high-end product that was locally inspired and could offer a piece of Whitefish, albeit a tasty one, for visitors to take with them.

“I wanted this business that could be really great for Whitefish, with local ingredients and could sustain some local hiring, and there’s just nothing like it,” he said. “I think everybody’s over huckleberry fudge, so I wanted something that was a local neat thing from Whitefish that people can take back with them.”

The roasted nuts come in seven different flavors, five sweet and two savory, and are roasted in a small commercial kitchen in the back of the building.

The flavors reflect the culture of the area, with names like Wildfire, Hiker’s Crunch and Bear Bait, which has cherries, blueberries and hazelnuts mixed in.

Scruggs said he recognizes that starting two businesses at once was a little nuts.

“I’ve learned that opening two businesses at the same time is insane. Your brain has a limit of bandwidth, and it’s hard to switch from one business to the other,” he said. “Absolutely, totally insane.”

While Scruggs said people shook their heads at first, the two-business plan has seen a lot of support so far. The idea, he said, is to get both businesses to support each other.

“It takes awhile to get an art gallery going, it takes awhile to get any business going, so I kind of like the idea that the two businesses can operate together in the same space. At least that’s the goal,” he said.

Both businesses are open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, noon to 6 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and closed Sunday and Monday.

For more information on the two businesses, visit bigmountainnuts.com and whiteapplegallery.com.