The pergolina story

I am Paulanna Cuccinello. I was a shopkeeper in Toluca Lake for thirty-five years, and now I run the pergolina.com online shop.

My family has deep roots in the Toluca Lake village. My grandfather landscaped homes here in the 1930s, including Bing Crosby's place on Forman Avenue. My parents, Anthony and Rose Chimo, ran a flower shop called Flowers by Anthony Rose on Riverside Drive for more than forty-five years. My father was a floral designer. My mother was an interior designer. I grew up surrounded by their work, and I never heard the word no when it came to making art.

I worked as a floral designer myself for fifteen years before I opened a little space of my own. In 1990, I opened pergolina at the front of my parents' shop. The name comes from a pergola, the kind of arbor you walk through into a garden. That is what I wanted the shop to feel like. A passage into something lovely. When my parents retired in 1995, I grew into their space and made the whole place mine.

I began as an artist, but there was never time for my art. So pergolina became my canvas. I let my imagination drive me, and I filled the shop with treasures from artists and makers near and far. The feeling is European, with an Italian undertone, the way I was raised.

The shop was always more than a store. I hosted art shows, taught Italian classes, and ran craft and painting days for the children. I chaired the Chamber's Holiday Open House for five years. In 2018, I helped lead a project to plant trees and green the median on Riverside Drive, and watching it come to life was one of my proudest moments. We had a no gossiping rule. Pergolina was a safe place to laugh and to cry, and the stories told inside stayed inside.

In 2019, the Toluca Lake Chamber of Commerce honored pergolina with its Small Business Award. But the real reward was always the people. The young men who came in for their first girlfriend's gift, grown now and still coming back. The little ones who came to play shop. The mail carrier, the regulars, the famous faces. They all felt like family. My husband, Steve, has been my silent partner and my right hand for more than fifty years.

After thirty-five years, I closed the doors of the brick-and-mortar store in May 2025. It was time to fly free. But pergolina is not gone. It is here, online, with the same hand-picked treasures and the same heart. Peek into the windows at night and the shop still comes alive. Pinocchio sings, and the dolls dance.

Pergolina has always been a haven for everyone, young and old. Be kind to one another. Treat all as if they were royalty.

I am so glad you found us. Come in and look around.