At most hours of the day, Knitty City is bustling with activity. Customers are constantly browsing through the soft woolen rainbows of yarn lining the walls, flipping through books, or simply chatting with each other while working on projects, needles in hand.
"I'm really proud of the community we've built here," Pearl Chin, the owner, told me. She said that some people come into Knitty City just to use it as a bookstore. She originally opened Knitty City in 2006 as a "yarn studio," but it has become so much more. People come by to take classes, to attend book signings, and sometimes just to hang out.
Pearl learned to knit when she was in her 30s and pregnant with her daughter. She taught herself from Barbara Walker's book, Learn-To-Knit Afghan. Pearl told me with a smile that she originally bought the book as a hardback for $6. She still carries the book, which she says is one of the best sources to learn from, but now it's a $20 paperback. Pearl knit for personal pleasure long before opening her store. She ran a wholesale business called A Thousand Cranes for many years that dealt in origami paper and kimono textiles. Her family once owned a grocery store, Bob's Supermarket, which evolved into a neighborhood hub. She yearned to have that sense of community again, and so she opened Knitty City, a place she hoped would attract a wide array of neighborhood faces.
Her dream has become a reality. One personal touch to the story that warmed my heart is that the little girl that Pearl gave birth to shortly after learning how to knit, Julie, is now in her thirties and an active member of the knitting community. Julie is responsible for coming up with the name, "Knitty City."