Yarn Shop Crawl

[KnittingKnoobie]

I live in the Gramercy Park section of Manhattan where there are no yarn shops. Whenever I want to go to a yarn store I have to either go uptown or downtown. It seems that the Upper East Side of Manhattan has the most yarn shops within walking distance of each other so Al and I decided to go check out what they had.
First we stopped at Annie & Company, known as Annie's, which is on Madison between 93rd and 94th Streets. They had a cute Easter display in the window with all spring colors and plastic Easter eggs. The store is lovely. It's huge and has a vast variety of different yarns. They have a huge table in the back of the store but I don't know if they welcome customers to sit and knit or if it's solely used for classes. They also have a great selection of needles, bags and accessories. The people who worked there were nice and polite, asking if we needed help and when told we didn't, left us to browse. We didn't see anything we wanted so we left empty handed.
The next place we went to was String, on East 82nd Street between Park and Lexington Avenues. This shop is located in a lovely old brownstone. All the yarns there are higher end, more expensive yarns so the variety is limited although it had a lovely selection of cashmere and silk. The woman working there was nice and polite asking if we needed anything. Al spoke to her a while about a sweater they had hanging and she obviously knew what she was talking about. They had a table in the back and a couple of women were sitting there knitting. Again we left with no yarn.
The third, and final, store we went to was called The Woolgathering which is located on 84th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenues. The outside of the store was really lovely, an old fashioned store front with big windows set in, what appeared to be, cast iron. This store was the smallest of the bunch but it was also my favorite. It was somewhat narrow with no room to sit and knit. The yarns were lovely and varied. They ranged from cashmeres to to acrylics. The woman who works there, Diane, explained that a lot of young mothers come in there and want yarn that can be easily washed. Diane was really nice and friendly. We wound up staying almost an hour just chatting and looking over everything she had there. I purchased two balls of what else? Cascade but not Pastaza this time! I got Cash Vero, 55% Merino extra fine wool, 33% Microfiber and 12% Cashmere, in two shades of a seafoam green. Al bought some yarn there also.
I wondered, after we left, what made us buy at one store and not the others? They all had lovely yarns, they were priced relatively similar and they all had yarns we both liked. I realized, for me, it was the customer service. Don't get me wrong, at Annie's and String the people were very nice and polite but at Woolgathering Diane was warm and chatty, but not overly so. She made us feel welcome and took time out just to talk to us for a while. If they had a place to sit, I'm sure that Al and I would have planted ourselves, whipped out knitting and spent the rest of the day there. Diane was what made the difference between liking a store and wanting to be there and spending money at the store. Thanks Diane!
Well that was our yarn shop crawl. It was fun and I'm sure we'll be doing it again this time on the Upper West Side. I may have to stop for a margarita along the way though. Shopping makes me thirsty.

Tags: knitting, yarn, crafts, nyc, shopping

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