It was only so long before I succumbed to my inner koigu. So yesterday I took a lunchtime field trip and walked up to Knit NY. It was the only one of the 3 koigu sources that I consider walking distance. It was too nice to squander the time by taking the subway. I wish I did.
While the store had a good selection of koigu and yes some came home with me (not to mention the opportunity to fondle first hand Misti Alpaca laceweight – which I orded from elsewhere when I got back), the trip didn’t have the same kind of satisfaction it should have.
First the store had an odor that reminded me of cat pee. Not one of my favorite smells, but as an owner of cats one that I am not unfamiliar with.
Ringing up my sale of two skeins of koigu took an amazingly long time. I complicated matters by changing my mind on one skein of Misti Alpaca and putting it back. The process was endless and it wasn’t because of a line as I was the only shopper there.
What had me really wishing that I had gone to my first choice of Purl was the $1 a use sign on the ballwinder!!! What’s up with that? There was a note on the table that indicated we were chipping in for a new one. Yeah not. I already plunked down my $40+ for one at home. If theirs was falling apart, buy a new one and write it off as a business expense. I think that was my last visit there and I’m not so hip to use that yarn..
I’ll take the subway next time.
I started the first row of the snowflake this morning on the train so Alex’s Fana is coming along. Not going to be able to go to the beloved SNB at Modern Yarn tonight as the folks are away for the weekend and I can’t get a babysitter. Sigh. I have to head there over the weekend though as the Cascade Bollicine in bright pink and white that I also ordered for Kat’s Fana is in. I’m eager to compare the yarns. I don’t much like the Checkheaton I’m using for Alex as it is very splitty though the results are nice.
Craft on!
9 responses so far ↓
1 Carole // Aug 17, 2006 at 5:25 pm
That’s ridiculous to charge a customer for using a ball winder. Good grief!
2 --Deb // Aug 17, 2006 at 6:43 pm
Yeah, really. A yarn shop that can’t supply its own ball-winder? That’s ridiculous! Definitely not worth the trip (even for Koigu).
Oh, and I have some Misti Alpaca laceweight (in, of course, green), and am just waiting for the perfect pattern to come along. That stuff is very, very nice!
3 Claudia // Aug 17, 2006 at 7:50 pm
Wow, you mean the fancy-schmanzy Knit New York as in http://www.knitnewyork.com/?
4 Betty // Aug 17, 2006 at 11:47 pm
Knit New York had a cat pee-like odor? And do they still have the cafe in the store? A store selling food smelling like cat pee? And they’ve got the nerve to charge to wind a ball of yarn??? Yikes! They are so not worth a lunch-time trip!!!
Sorry you had a less-than-great experience. However, that’s some mighty purty Koigu you got there!
5 beth // Aug 18, 2006 at 4:26 pm
Is that the store near Washington Square Park? They sell coffee and cookies and stuff? The yarn is in the back? If it is, I didn’t like that store at all. It didn’t smell though when I was there. I like Purl much better too! (I was in NYC last year on a business trip)
6 Angelia // Aug 18, 2006 at 10:31 pm
Inner voices – haha! I have yet to try , or even see (in person) koigu. I have some koigu inner voices, too. Now I just need to find some (koigu).
I cannot believe that a yarn shop – a BUSINESS -cannot afford a ball winder! Do they sell their yarn at wholsale prices or something, so that they make no profit??? And cat pee? Guess they don’t want any business.
7 Debi // Aug 19, 2006 at 7:45 am
A dollar to use the ball winder because they needed to get another one! As a shop, are they not familiar with the term WHOLESALE. GEEZE, they should just buy the damn thing and stop being so cheap.
8 Madame Purl // Aug 21, 2006 at 1:59 pm
Well, that ball winder story just takes the cake in my book. Don’t these yarn stores get it yet? Blogging has changed things – bad press gets out on blogs.
9 Juno // Aug 22, 2006 at 1:25 pm
That is just bizarre.
I mean – how is that not the same register tape and windex on the list of legitimate store equipment? Just – odd. Like you should all chip in becasue this is a yarn commune? Not. I mean, I noticed they charged for the Koigu.