Shopping at Sew Expo

I went to Sew Expo with a shopping list. It is so easy to get overwhelmed when presented with nine or ten aisles that look like this:

Disneyland for sewists.

As soon as the doors opened, I raced to the Amanda’s Bundles booth. They’ve gotten the majority of my shopping dollars at each Sew Expo. I knew they were going to be stocking this fabric and I didn’t want to miss getting some:

Amanda’s Bundles is based in LA and specializes in athleisure fabrics (yes, that’s a thing). These are two different fabrics with the same print in slightly different colorways. The one on the left is a single-brushed poly and the one on the right is called Peached Performance fabric. PP is very similar to the fabric found in higher-end leggings and tops.

I also bought this PP print:

And this one:

These will all become hoodies of some sort.

Amanda’s has limited amounts of designer deadstock. I scored three yards of a black Italian wool blend suiting fabric, at least some of which is destined for a pair of pants. It is gorgeous!

Billie’s Designer Fabrics also had a booth full of apparel fabric. I’ve shopped with them at past Expos, but was a bit disappointed in the selection this year as it was mostly fabrics in muddy earth tones. Not a hot pink or emerald green in sight. 😞

I bought a few yards of some cottons at Vogue Fabrics and picked up some supplies at the Klum House booth, where apparently they know me because I buy from them regularly. The cashier who helped me recognized my name immediately.

My overall impression of Expo this year was that it continues to shrink. (I’ve been to all three since they began meeting in person again after the pandemic.) All of the vendors were in one hall. I am not sure why, although it made shopping much easier. The classrooms downsized from three buildings to two, and the whole event just didn’t seem as crowded as in previous years. Classes were smaller. Noticeably absent were Joe Veccharelli and his company French European, as well as the Gammill longarm people. I suspect Gamill is getting a lot of competition now because all of the major machine manufacturers have some version of frame and/or sit-down longarm machines. Gammill used to be the only game in town.

Putting on these kind of events—and making them profitable enough to continue—is a challenge. Because a lot of teachers are now offering online courses, people no longer need to travel to take classes. I think Washington State University had some personnel issues, too, because the class coordinator I had been dealing with through August disappeared suddenly last fall and was replaced by someone else.

A few days after Expo, all of the teachers received an e-mail from the class coordinator in which she stated that teachers would be expected to have a booth at next year’s Expo or be associated with a vendor booth—I was loosely associated with Wonderfil this year—AND they would be expected to be in that booth to answer questions from students outside of class. I think the Expo organizers must have received some pushback on that policy, because yesterday, all the teachers received a second e-mail stating that that policy had been rescinded. I had sent a response to the first e-mail saying that I thought that expectation was a bit unreasonable. In order for me to have a booth after class, I have to have something to sell. My knitting patterns are digital downloads. I could sell copies of my books, but then I am not only schlepping class materials in from the parking lot, I’m also schlepping cases of books and everything I need to sell them. And that makes for an incredibly long day after teaching two three-hour classes. I’m glad they rescinded the policy, because if it had stood, I doubt I’d be teaching there again.