I had been living in LA for 4 years now, and unfortunately haven't been visiting too many local yarn stores yet. One of my goal this year is to visit as many as possible.
The past Saturaday, Hansi was going to the West side for work and we were meeting friends over that side afterwards, so I took the opportunity to explore the yarn stores in that area. The cool part is that I do that all by walking -- very unusal in LA.
When I first walked into the Yarn Unlimited, I was a bit intimiadated by its 'silence' -- there were no customers nor staffs in sight. But the radio was playing, so I imagine someone should be there. Earlier that day I went to Skein in Pasadena and got the pattern for Norah Gaughan's Ellis, so I was trying to see if there are any good substitute yarn for my new project (I don't really like the color of the Berroco Suede that called by the pattern).
After I browsed for about 5-10 minutes, there was a lady showed up behind the counter and finally asked if she could help me with anything. I asked her few quesitons baout Berroco Suede, which they only have singles left. She was not really helpful in general, especially when I asked her for alternative suggestions. Finally I decided to keep explore by myself (I don't want to just leave the shop after walking 15 minutes there~~).
In general, I like the store 'down-to-earth' setting. They have a lot of selection on the 'basic' yarns (i.e. wool, cottons etc) -- and carry many colors too. There were some fancy/playful yarn, and I almost got trapped by the $35/hank 'Oriental' (safely escaped later...). I was more impressed in the 'back' of the store, where they stock almost every color of Sugar'n Cream cotton -- very impressive. The 'Candian $3.99' rack at the back is also interesting. I think I might go back there to shop when it's time for winter knitting.
Although they do not have fancy/hip/stylish decoration in the store (which is always fun to look at, but also means the cost is factored into the yarn), I do like the shopkeeper. During the later part of the shopping experience, another shop keeper (a male) came back, and I had a better experience with him. He's more helpful, and told me that they can order more Classic Cotton for me. I like when he joked when he showed me the color color sample booklet -- 'there are 120-something color, hope there's enough to choose from'.
At the end, I chose some Takhi Classic Cotton for the Ellis project, and 2 balls of German yarn on the 50% off section -- which I somehow fall in love the way how those 2 colors look when they are right next to each other. The pricing are quite reasonable in this shop. It's a good one to visit if you have a particular project in mind, to find what you need.
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