It’s 8:58 a.m. on a winter Wednesday, and New Bern Avenue is just beginning to stir. Inside the Little Blue Bakehouse, however, select bakers have been working since dawn in a shared kitchen, crafting baked goods, refining their brands and mapping out their futures.

Within the shared kitchen that College of Humanities and Social Sciences’ (CHASS) alumna Allison Vick founded, aspiring bakers transform ideas into products and passions into possibilities. More than a workspace, the kitchen is a reminder that human connection, creativity and empathy remain essential ingredients for success in a technology-driven world.

That human-centered vision is rooted in Vick’s education from NC State. A 2010 graduate with dual degrees in Spanish and textile apparel and management, she credits her academic experience with sharpening the skills that guide her work as an entrepreneur: active listening, communicating across differences and understanding what motivates people. Her mastery of Spanish, which she uses daily, has been invaluable in ensuring all customers feel welcome.

“My Spanish degree has really helped me foster relationships and build inclusivity here in our exact community.

“My Spanish degree has really helped me foster relationships and build inclusivity here in our exact community because we get a lot of clients that come in who are native Spanish speakers, “ Vick said. “My college experience prepared me for running a business that is collaborative and community-focused.”

Those skills continue to shape the bakehouse, which Vick opened three years ago with her husband, Carl, a fellow CHASS alumnus with a degree in philosophy. The couple envisioned a kitchen exclusively for bakers to pursue entrepreneurship without the overwhelming startup costs of a traditional brick-and-mortar shop.

“We could provide a stepping stone for small bakery businesses that want to grow or see how they can grow their business or what happens if they grow their business,” Allison said. “Our shared space essentially models a real-world experience.”

The couple also imagined a community space for the people who live and work nearby — people like themselves, small business owners raising two young children while building careers and putting down roots. Since opening, the Vicks have welcomed a rotating roster of baker members who produce and sell their goods through the bakehouse.

“I like to think that the greatest impact that we’ve had is keeping these unique businesses in operation,” Allison said. “It is very, very hard for small businesses to survive, particularly in a difficult economy.”

At any given time, five member businesses sell in the shop’s retail space. The one constant is Little Blue Macaron, Allison’s macaron business that set the couple on their culinary and entrepreneurial path.

That journey began eight years ago when the Vicks returned to Raleigh from Austin, where Allison worked as a pastry chef, and Carl had completed his master’s degree in counseling. Expecting their first child and eager to be close to family, they came home with a growing sense that food, community and entrepreneurship could meaningfully interact.

“I like to think that the greatest impact that we’ve had is keeping these unique businesses in operation.”

Allison’s passion for pastry making, particularly macarons, was refined through years of trial, error, experimentation and baking out of a commercial kitchen shared with various food producers. What didn’t exist locally then was a kitchen designed specifically for bakers.

When the couple wanted to open their own store, they realized that a macaron-and-coffee shop alone might not be sustainable. But a shared kitchen model dedicated to bakers, and centered on collaboration and community, could be. When they found the New Bern Avenue location — near popular Alamo Drafthouse Cinema — they saw an opportunity to meet market demand and neighborhood need.

What of challenges?

“My husband and I had never done this before, so this was a brand-new concept, and it was a massive learning curve,” Allison said. “But we put everything back into the business that we get out of it, so I would not say that it is an operation that is really making us rich, but it is a passion project that fills our cup.”

It is also a concept that works because it serves people.

This winter morning, that mission is on full display. The scent of baked goods mingles with roasting coffee as students study and friends swap stories. Behind the display cases filled with cupcakes, brownies, doughnuts, bread, pastries and macarons, a large window reveals the kitchen beyond, where bakers work side by side, creating, talking and sharing.

There, Allison is focused on the pastel-colored shells that will become the day’s macarons — lavender, pistachio and brown butter vanilla, the bakehouse’s most popular flavors. Then there’s her personal favorite, dulce de leche, a nod to her husband’s Chilean heritage, and her signature blue macarons: Carolina blue, which matches her son’s eyes and inspired the names of both businesses.

Around her, ovens hum, mixers whir and pans clatter as bakers move with purpose. The activity is nonstop, equaled only by Allison’s passion for the work. After years of baking, producing 350 to 400 macarons daily at the bakehouse, she still loves what she does.

While Allison is the baker, she and her husband share responsibility for every aspect of the business. That same philosophy extends to the bakehouse.

Six-month contracts, which can be renewed, include a clause allowing each baker to claim two priority products that others cannot replicate. Combined with a careful selection process that emphasizes distinct offerings, the model aims to remove competition.

The model also focuses on the bakehouse’s role as a community space; it hosts book clubs, among other activities, after hours.

“One of the greatest things we’ve learned while being here is what a need this community has for a third space; we have a lot of people who use this space for community-centered events, and we don’t want to lose that,” she said.

The couple is exploring an expansion into an adjacent vacant storefront, and their vision includes room for those gatherings to grow alongside an artist collective. There, visual artists and crafters could sell their work.

“It’s essentially the bakehouse, but for hard goods,” Allison said.

Those choices reflect lessons she traces to her NC State education, which she describes as a philosophy rooted in collaboration, care and shared drive.

“Whatever your degree program is, there’s always a sense of community,” she said, adding that collaborating with classmates to solve problems provided practical experience. At the Little Blue Bakehouse, she fosters that same community spirit, leading her next-generation bakers to accomplish more as a Pack.