Hound & Hare Opens Showroom

From our November/December 2025 Issue

In 2017 Eric Nicholas put in his notice at work and, with his wife, Amy, started Hound & Hare. It was a courageous move designed to bring previously unavailable international sporting apparel and accessories to the US. The couple has spent the subsequent seven years providing online sales and attending annual events, including the Orvis Game Fair, the SCI and Dallas Safari Club conventions, a host of local events in the midst of Kentucky’s horse and bourbon worlds, and more.

This past spring the Nicholas’s vision took an even bolder turn with the opening of The Barn at TweedBriar, a self-described “sporting barn” that houses not only Hound & Hare’s administrative and online operations, but also a beautifully appointed retail space. (The name was derived by combining the names of the Nicholas’s English cocker spaniels: Tweed and Briar.) Located 14 miles from Lexington, Kentucky, and its international airport, the Hound & Hare showroom is open by appointment and for special events that take place at nearby Keeneland, arguably the thoroughbred capital of the world. Just down the road is the headquarters of the University of Kentucky’s polo and rodeo teams.

“It’s always been our vision to have a retail space to host events and invite customers from around the world to and to make our carefully chosen products available,” Eric Nicholas said. “Opening TweedBriar is the next chapter in Amy’s and my vision. We now offer our own brand of clothing, including dry wax and tweed. For example, through our collaboration with Ermilio Clothier & Specialty Shop, near Philadelphia, we can provide extremely high-quality, semi-customized sets of tweed in just 12 weeks. Having a showroom right in the heart of Kentucky allows us to do the things we’ve always dreamed of.”

In addition to the Hound & Hare label of clothing and accessories, the company offers brands such as Kingfisher Leatherworks (cartridge bags), Hartwell (women’s and men’s clothing), Hicks & Brown (fedoras), MacWet (gloves) and more. TweedBriar is located at 1575 Troy Road, in Wilmore, Kentucky. For more information, visit houndhare.com.