The second quilt shop we visited on our beach weekend was Center Diamond Fabrics in Cannon Beach, Oregon.
It's housed in a historical site. Here's the sign at the front door about Van Vleet Logging Company, responsible for logging most of the Tillamook Burn.
When I walked through the front door, I walked left to the far corner of the shop and took a picture. The structure appears small on the outside, but is deceptively large on the inside. There was a ton of fabric to browse here with something for everyone's tastes.
There was a good supply of regional fabric in the form of the beach scenes. When I'm visiting quilt shops in different parts of the country, this is what I'm looking for...something I can't get locally.
They had some adorable patterns for sale and hanging on the walls of the shop. This one was called "Male Bonding".
Cannon Beach is situated next to haystack rock, an iconic sea stack along the Oregon coast.
There be puffins living on haystack rock and the shop had a cute little puffin quilt.
I love the details in the puffin.
These sand fabrics were very tempting. I'm gearing up to start on a quilt from some of our "shadow self" pictures, and these would have worked well as backgrounds. I passed them by however.
Being a sucker for sock monkeys, this one made me smile.
So I'm going to stop here, but I have something else to say about this shop below. I'm sort of saving it because I don't know the whole story, and I haven't taken the time to ask. This is a great shop...lots of great fabrics and absolutely worth stopping in. It had a small parking lot in front of the store, and there was plenty of parking to be had within walking distance. As a quilt shop, I give it my highest rating of five rotary cutters.
Here's the thing that bothered me about this shop. Toward the rear of the store, high on a wall, I spied these quilts:
If that carrot quilt looks familiar to you, it's because it's a free pattern available online from allpeoplequilt.com. The quilt shown here is identical to the free pattern online except that it uses fabric for the stem of the carrot instead of felt as the online pattern does. Nevertheless, the pattern is available for sale for $9 here, and if you're so inclined, you can buy a kit for $28.95.
According to the allpeoplequilt.com website, the quilt was designed by Shelley Robson of The Quilted Forest, an Iowa quilt shop. It was featured in the Spring, 2006 issue of Quilts and More. Since I didn't take the time to inquire further about this of the busy employee, and since I haven't taken the time to contact the shop owner, I won't draw any conclusions here about it. I'll leave that up to you. I'll just say I left the store after seeing this and leave it at that.
*Disclaimer: Cat Patches accepts no advertising, nor any sponsorships. The opinions expressed on this blog are based on the personal impressions and perceptions of the author. They are formed on the basis of one short visit, on one day, and may or may not reflect the experience of others visiting on a different day. They are no more descriptive than a single snapshot image can be, and nothing written in a review of a quilt shop should be construed as objective fact. The reviews are strictly the author's subjective opinion and should not be interpreted as anything more.
10 comments:
Cute little shops - unfortunately I am seeing more of this free pattern sale thing in ground shops as well as etsy and craftsy.
No wonder Smitty was waking up at 4:30 am and vocal.
nice informations for cattery patches :)
I'm not into the table runner thing, but that is interesting (drawing my own conclusion and keeping it to myself). On a note of clarity, I clicked the link you provided for the free pattern, and noticed that The Quilted Forest is not the same as Greenbaum's Quilted Forest in Salem though. At the bottom of the link there is an offer to buy a kit through The Quilted Forest in Forest City, IA. Nice review of the store as a whole, I too remember they had a whole LOT of fabric when I visited in February.
The free pattern/for sale issue is disturbing, but I've seen it before. I've also see almost complete copies of projects without credit on a number of blogs.
I also have to say that anyone who wants to have a carrot runner or place mat should probably be charged $9 for introducing ugly into the world!
It's a tardis-like shop - bigger on the inside!
As to the free pattern for sale, I'll keep my conclusions to myself too. But I might have knocked the ratings back a quarter of a rotary cutter or so.
hi barbara, this is julie walker and i own center diamond. a good customer of mine lead me to your comments about the shop. thanks for your nice comments! the table runner you are pointing out is a pattern that is for sale from pieced tree patterns with a copyright of 2006 on it, called garden fresh table runners. i do not sell ANY pattern i receive for free and in fact, several of the kits/samples i have on the wall do have free patterns for them. since there is a similar pattern being offered for free, i am closing out of that pattern now. i hope you'll come back and visit when you're in the area!
julie - center diamond
Looks like a nice shop. That puffin is so cute!
Looks like a good shop. And based on the comment of the owner, a pretty ethical place as well.
Lots of neat fabrics! I would be interested in the shops answers about the carrot!
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