BUTTONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, everyone, time to come look!   Larry and Ellen and Sunday Holm and I have worked like beavers to get an entire basement-level (I guess I'm supposed to say 'garden level') room lined with new and vintage buttons!   Come look.  It's pretty amazing.  If you have suits or coats with boring buttons, a fun thing to do is to buy vintage ones -- even mismatched ones -- and replace them.  You can decorate necklines with a billion small buttons; you can put a huge one in the center of a pillow.  Come look.   ALSO:   We have a weenie roast going tomorrow (Saturday).      svb

The Button Room Is Ready To Use. It took a lot more effort than we thought, but The Button Room is finally presentable. We will be doing final sorting and adjusting, but whew!! Amazingly, even with over 30 linear feet (240 square feet) we're not going to put all the buttons on the boards.  We're putting an assortment of fancy and workaday buttons up first ... both vintage and artist-made. You can see amazingly wonderful incised mother of pearl buttons that are over a 100 years old. There is also probably the best collection in these parts of Victorian black glass and fancy Victorian metal buttons. There are single buttons and sets. Upstairs, in addition to the Button Room, we have created an easy-to-access display of glass buttons by well known artists.  They include: Michigan artist Terry Voigt, Oregon button maker Sheila Ernst and sets of buttons from the Canadian studio Bejeweled & Bedazzled. And, more will be coming. There will be a little bit of "pardon our clutter" as we put the finishing details to the Button Room, but do stop by and see it.   Another Reminder:   Sandra & Larry   PS: Stop by this weekend. Just sit and knit. No purchase required. Just your smiling face. Click for Sandra's Blog  artisán knitworks   23616 Farmington Rd |Farmington | MI | 48080 |248-427-0804

OK guys, listen up!

Everyone, I just concluded a long series of e-mail exchanges with a good friend of mine in another Metro Detroit  knit shop.  She had forwarded a newsletter to me from yet another shopkeeper-in-distress, this time in northern Michigan.  Shops are comparing notes.  And here is what we are learning.  Now, this may be how things have to be.  But if you think it does NOT have to be this way, do what you can to support local yarn shops.  There is simply no substitute for face-to-face talk, for face-to-face instruction, and for actual TOUCHING of yarns.   Here is what we experience:

*  People buy  yarn on line and then come into shops to have it wound into balls. (!!!)
*  People buy yarn on line and then come into shops to get help with a pattern they downloaded.
*  Customers come into shops (I had one two days ago) to find out what they like, copy down the yarn name and color, then go away and buy it on line. lt might be cheaper by a few cents.  But you should at least think about the fact that a website has very little overhead.  
* Customers buy yarn from us, then download free patterns, can't understand them or find mistakes, give up, and try to return yarn that no longer has labels.  People learn to hate knitting when there is a bad pattern.  Remember that it's not the yarn's fault, and that shops will help you fix a bad pattern or sell you a good one. 
* Customers (this is a common one) get on YouTube for instruction, need more help because the video was too fast or not very good, and then get mad because a shop want to charge for help.  Five bucks is usually all it takes.  Why?  In my shop, one woman said, "Well, You Tube is free."   That's pretty hard to dispute.

I could go on and on.  I have to say I'm troubled.   Fiber-arts people are incredibly honest, nice, good people.  In all of the years of business, we have had only one bounced check, and t hat was from a scam artist known to the police.   I love fiber people.   It's only that we need to think about our choices before making them, and agree not to ask things of LYS's that are unfair and even costly.

OK?  Knit on and Stay Calm.

svb      

LOOK WHAT LAURA DID!

LOOK what Laura Bryant has done!!!!   My god, this is drop-dead amazing.  And it also speaks to the blossoming that I have seen in her designing over the past 2-3 years -- as I told her yesterday, it's as if she's made a quantum leap into some new realm.  This looks like couture woven fashion.  One side of the fabric uses a gathered/ruche stitch.   

This is also the last issue of Knit-Style, which is hugely saddening.   If you want to attempt this beautiful design, we can get kits from Prism Yarn.  Just come in to Artisan Knitworks and ask.

svb

LOOK AT THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

From yarn rep Diane Harker's Facebook page -- what a hoot!

 

Diana Harker shared Car Talk's photo.

Yesterday at 10:02am ·

Hey! Who says "Grannies" can only do this? This IS NOT Grandma's knitting anymore! Now, this is what I call some serious yarn bombing! So artistic and creative! ‪#‎ifyoudontknityoudontknowwhatyouaremissing‬

Car Talk

GUILD NIGHT

Members of ALL guilds (chapters of TKGA and CGOA, independent groups meeting in  homes or coffee shops, spinners, etc. etc.) have a special night at Artisan Knitworks -- every second Tuesday starting at about 6:30 until ... whenever.   Good snacks and a 10% discount on all full-price stuff!!!   svb

Sales and Books and Stuff

Guys, I have been really negligent with this blog -- not because I don't enjoy it (I DO!) but because I am in the throes, the final, awful throes, of book completion.  The book contract is signed and sent back to Cambridge U Press, and now I have to really finish it (AGGGGHHH), which means getting the last 50 pages in order, consolidating 2,000+ footnotes (I'm not kidding), and drafting a decent conclusion to replace the dribs and drabs now in the file.  So.  I'm SO sorry, I WILL get back to it, and not too long from now.  I should have been finished last week.

In the meantime, we have the gorgeous Prism trunk show in the shop for a few more days only (until the 4th or 5th), and the final final final days of our what-fun-it-is Summer Treasure Hunt -- we need to GET RID of yarn that has been in the shop for too long.  The space is full, if you can believe it, and we need to buy some new stock.  So we are inviting you to SEARCH for inventory numbers between 0 and 600 (half off!) and 600 to 999 (30% off). 

The inventory numbers can be found on each skein --    10-00599, for instance.  (In this case, the inventory number is 599).  There are lots of these older skeins, some of them handcrafted. 

Come help us out.  I'd really like to get rid of some of those gorgeous hand-painted sock skeins, just as you come in the shop on the left -- maybe Naomi Frankel's students (on the 9th, there is sock class!) should snap them up.  I can't justify buying more of those wonderful onesies at fiber festivals until the ones we have walk out the door.

Adios!      svb

Join us at Artisan Knitworks on June 19 and 26 (Thursdays) at about 6:30 until 8:30 for the first of several crochet-alongs.  The object of our attention will be Sandra's "Madrid Shawl."  This is an easy garment -- yarn is a variegated wool-silk blend by Noro, though you can use any DK or sport-weight yarn.  We ask only that you buy it from us.  You get a pattern pamphlet too!   We can adjust the width and length to suit your body size and height.  

Do call the shop and reserve a spot (248-427-0804) or register on-line at www.artisanknitworks.com.  If your crochet is rusty, stop by early -- we can run you through chaining and single crochet.  I will teach you the double crochet if you don't know how -- and I'll help you with the little puffs along the edge as well.   FUN!    svb