The aroma of Boise Blue art supply store is an indistinguishable mix of pencil lead, wood shavings, new paper and free-floating "old building."

That aroma - like watching the documentary "Crumb," which did for pens and paper what Ken Burns' documentary did for baseball - has the undeniable power to make one want to go home right now and draw.

The store, formerly Boise Blueprint, marks its 70th year this month. For much of that time, it has been owned by the Robinsons.

Sisters Terrie Robinson and Janet Hackett have been co-owners since 1988, but their Boise Blue history goes way back.

Their father, Jack Robinson, became a co-owner in the late 1950s. He's listed in the Idaho State Softball Hall of Fame. The trophies that still line the walls of the store represent 11 years of victories for the Boise Blue men's slowpitch softball team.

"He didn't have sons," Terrie Robinson said. "So he adopted half the town."

Jack Robinson, who died in 2002, did have daughters.

He hired them - no paychecks - to work at the shop when they were still in elementary school.

They assembled school art kits and kept track of the seasonal decorations the store once sold, cardboard turkeys, jack o' lanterns and the like.

"We were young, but we could count," Terrie Robinson said.

She teaches piano in her spare time and has a reputation for teaching art-supply salespeople things they didn't know about their own products.

Hackett handles the business side - the books, the computer. She likes the "accidental discoveries" made between sales of 40 by 60 sheets of handmade watercolor paper - like the many uses for colored acetate.

Besides silk screening and collage, acetate makes a cheap patch for a crushed taillight.

"And someone figured out that it can block out shapes and help dyslexic kids read," Hackett said. "Weird stuff like that. That's what makes this work rewarding."

Jerry Breaux, co-owner of BanBury Golf Course in Eagle, has been shopping at Boise Blue for 30 years. The store helps him maintain one of golf's traditions: hand-lettered scoreboards and banners.

Breaux, now in his 60s, learned calligraphy as a teenager working at a golf course in Florida. He has taught calligraphy to local golf pros and wouldn't think of going anywhere but Boise Blue for his favorite "Y&C nontoxic calligraphy pens in a 3.5-millimeter width."

"If they ever caught me, Jack would come out of his grave and Terrie would kill me," Breaux said. "Life would be over."

PARIS ON THE BOISE RIVER?

The store has been in its current Jefferson Street location, with aroma, squeaky floors and skylight, for more than 30 years.

In its early days, Boise Blue was a kind of graphic "catch-all," making architectural blueprints and wedding invitations and selling commercial sign-making supplies, bridge sets, greeting cards and playing cards.

"We were kind of the Hallmark store before Hallmark," Hackett said.

But Boise Blue always catered to a clientele serious about its art supplies, including Old Boise figures like Cornelia Hart Farrer, doyenne of the Boise art scene.

Born at the turn of the century, Farrer hosted plein-air watercolor sessions around town and helped establish the Boise Art Museum.

"Her group reminded me of the groups that formed in Paris - friendship-oriented," Terrie Robinson said.

Farrer's sister-in-law, Helen Hart, taught art to generations of Boise children in South Boise and was so loyal a customer that Boise Blue named a paintbrush after her.

Award-winning Boise painter John Collias has been a customer since World War II. Now, at age 90, he drops by the store a few times a week, whether he needs art supplies or not.

Collias describes himself as "an old fire horse" when it comes to his Boise Blue habit.

"Even if there's no fire, he gets out and runs," Collias quipped.

"I've already told Terrie: When I die, my funeral procession will pass by Boise Blue."

SMALL BUSINESS IN THE INTERNET AGE

The store's move to the "new" Jefferson Street location cemented its reputation for quality supplies.

The Robinsons moved away from the blueprints and craft items, though to this day they still display tubes of paint in old greeting card racks and have never been inclined to update.

Like other small businesses, Boise Blue has suffered in the age of online commerce.

Robinson tells the story of spending time with customers, explaining products in detail, only to have them get on the phone in front of her to ask someone to "Google" a better price.

But being a small business allows for innovation, too.

Boise Blue was one of the first suppliers of M. Graham paints, high-end oils made with walnut oil that don't call for toxic solvents.

One of the sisters' regular customers is a Japanese artist who flies in from Asia, checks into a hotel in New York City, and orders M. Graham paint from Boise Blue.

Robinson and Hackett believe the store's survival is due to its experienced staff - practicing artists who can talk authoritatively about Japanese rice paper or Sculpey clay.

Michael Anne Stout has worked at the store for 28 years. In a nod to Old Boise continuity, she lives in Cornelia Hart Farrer's small house in the upper reaches of Downtown. One of Farrer's murals still covers a basement wall.

Hackett and Robinson live by certain business principles. Special orders don't require a deposit.

"Customers don't have the product, so why should we have the money?" Robinson said. "Most people wouldn't think of ripping you off."

And Robinson and Hackett wouldn't think of ripping their customers off. While it's possible to spend anywhere from 99 cents to $500 on a paint brush at Boise Blue, chances are slim that a beginning painter will walk out having bought silk when muslin would suffice.

"We're not going to put a 5-year-old into a tube of professional paint," Hackett said, as if fitting a customer with the right product were something akin to fitting a child with the right pair of school shoes.

"We sell people what they need, not what we think they could use," Robinson said.

"Maybe we've lost sales. But we get repeat customers."

Anna Webb: 377-6431