Field Trip: Spool of Thread

Today I made my first visit to Vancouver's new sewing lounge, Spool of Thread. And what a cute little shop it is! I almost lament being blessed to own my sewing equipment, as it seems like it'd be such a fun place to hang out and work.

Usually, the "planning" stage of any sewing project for me consists of an impulsive trip to whatever chain sewing store I'm familiar with, flipping through The Big 3 pattern catalogues, making a choice and picking the most suitable fabric available that I can afford. Now, that's not to say that this is always a bad idea - sometimes being impulsive and spontaneous can be fun and rewarding. But it's certainly not the smartest or most relaxing way to go about things. (Especially when it usually ends with you forgetting to buy some important notions in your rush out the door!)

Not this time, folks. Nope, I'm putting my best foot forward and doing my research. In keeping with my rule to use local and/or independent patterns for at least three garments this year, I've been browsing around and I quickly found two pattern companies being raved about in the blogosphere - one of which is local to Vancouver. Win! And as it happens, both are carried in stock at Spool of Thread. Double win!

Hence, today's field trip. It's a good thing I'd done my planning ahead of time because it's so far from my work I only had ten minutes to get in and out the door! But I was successful, and I picked up two patterns to kick of my 2011 sewing:

First, we have Sencha from Colette Patterns:

Second, we have Pendrell from the local Sewaholic Patterns:

I have a few thoughts about both, but I'll save them for more specific posts in the coming months. Let's just say I think both have the potential to be very beautiful garments and I'm hoping that I'm up to the challenge of creating them!

In the meantime, I have some supplies to buy - particularly fabric. I'm thinking of silks... mmm, silk.