Businesswoman Angel Burgess left a longtime bank career and a night job to follow her dream of owning a shoe boutique.A2Z Shoes & Accessories celebrated its grand opening on Saturday on York Street, St George’s.The trendy men’s, women and children’s shoe and fashion jewellery store joins several boutiques that have recently opened in the Old Town, including The Cave and Last Night Boutique, both on York Street.Ms Burgess admits she took a chance by leaving her career at Butterfield Bank in corporate services and also quitting her part-time job at Black Horse Tavern where she had worked as a waitress for nearly 20 years.“It was a tough decision,” Ms Burgess said. “But I didn’t want to be 60-plus years old and doing something I didn’t like or never having followed my dream.”She added: “The recession has been hard on a lot of people, but it has given others the chance to do things they would never have had the opportunity to do. It has opened up a lot of buildings and spaces for businesses.”Ms Burgess used her own savings to launch the business.And to keep costs down, she, a creative cousin and other family and close friends, worked long hours and many nights to redesign the space and renovate it themselves.Formerly occupied by Four Star Pizza, they came up with artful ways to cover ugly tile and pipes left by the previous tenant.They also came up with unique ways to display the shoes, an attractive “wallpaper” made from recycled newsprint, and they used bright neon paint for pops of colour on walls and vents.In the children’s section, Ms Burgess’ young daughters Ziye and Zoya did the colourful handprints to decorate the walls, and her eldest helps with choosing trendy new styles.Mr Burgess said she keeps only a small stock of shoes sizes for each style, all displayed on the shop floor for convenience.A2Z customers can be assured hardly anyone else will be wearing the same shoe they buy, she noted.Ms Burgess said she is also looking at bringing in larger ladies’ shoe sizes and more fashion jewellery based on what celebrities are wearing on the red carpet and on popular reality TV shows including Basketball Wives.She carries leather school shoes for under $50, boots, trendy styles from Qupid and other brands, plus styles with tassels and platforms that are popular with teens right now.Her hours are 10.30am to 7pm Monday to Thursday, and 11am to 8pm Fridays and Saturdays, but she points out, she lives close by in St David’s and customers are welcome to call the number on the door if they need some shoes in a hurry.