Old Craft, New Technologies – Woolstock’s Latest Twist
by Maureen Kilcullen, DBED Marketing & Communications
Feeling sheepish about your winter wardrobe? Itching to try something new? Leslye Solomon, owner of Woolstock Yarn Shop, has just the solution. The entrepreneur has parlayed her passion for knitting into a multi-faceted business reaching customers across the nation and overseas. Fourteen years ago she opened Woolstock, tucked away in quaint Glyndon, a historic village that dates to the late 1800s.
Woolstock Yarn Shop in Glyndon
“My business now has many aspects – from the yarn shop serving the local community, the people who travel to us from long distances, to the manufacture of the various knitting products we create right here in Maryland,” Leslye says.
With an array of beautiful yarns, easy and intricate patterns for clothing of all types, and a staff of knitting and crocheting experts, Leslye’s shop is treasure trove of ideas and innovation. Walk into Woolstock on any Saturday afternoon and for a moment, you’ll think you stepped back in time. A cadre of women is seated around a farm table – knitting needles flying and conversation flowing – in a scene reminiscent of the quilting bees that sprang up in the early 19thcentury. Yet Woolstock is not your great-grandma’s yarn shop.
Saturday afternoon knitting group
Instead, Leslye marries old traditions with new technologies. Newcomers and old-timers alike are welcomed into what she describes as “the community of friends” gathered around Woolstock’s table every week. Wander around the shop and you can’t help but be intrigued by the colors and textures of the yarn – everything from hand-dyed merino wool to glow-in-the-dark nylon fiber, in a spectrum of colors from lime juice and cobalt to flashdance and violet tulip. It’s hard not to get hooked.
Woolstock 's array of yarns
Leslye, who has taught both hand and machine knitting across the country for more than 20 years, offers private lessons as well as classes and seminars to those interested in learning to knit or improving techniques. She’s produced nine instructional knitting DVDs, including “The Absolute Best Way to Learn How to Knit” that demonstrates the basics of both the American and Continental methods of knitting. Her latest innovation is KnitSpeaker, an application for Apple mobile devices that allows knitters to input stitch repeat patterns and knit at a comfortable pace while listening to instructions. With this app, paper patterns are passé. The KnitSpeaker app is now being sold from the Apple App Store to consumers all over the world.
Personalized service, though, is still in vogue at Woolstock. Despite the modernisms, Leslye and her team of eight provide the attention, advice and assistance to patrons that is hard to find online. They’ll keep you in stitches.
