Sew Productive - Melinda Noble's one-stop shop for all things sewing - is now almost double the size.
The departure of another Acton fixture, the Concept Leather Company, presented Noble with an opportunity. As the two businesses were neighbours in the same building, she pounced on the chance to stitch the two spaces together.
This expansion has created a number of ideas for change. In Sew Productive's old space, which was located in the back of the building at 47 Mill St. E., conducting retail activities and sewing classes at the same time was difficult.
With the much larger area, Noble's customers now have "a permanent studio space which can be used during the day without people feeling like they're interrupted."
The business's evolution has been, in short, fast. Noble describes receiving a "warm welcome" from the community, with customers also coming from far afield.
"My first customer at my grand opening was from Kitchener," she remembered. Representatives of sewing guilds from Erin, Guelph, Burlington and Flamborough, among others, have "scouted" her locations, as she puts it.
A strong business outlook and the neighbouring space opening up allowed her to increase the size of Sew Productive from 700 square feet to roughly 1,300 or so.
When she originally opened her shop in October of 2022, she planned on creating a hub where her customers can not only buy sewing supplies – like tools, thread and cloth – but also take classes, rent time on sewing machines and get machines repaired and serviced.
But the small space forced Noble to postpone some of those services. While she had the idea to offer time on machines, "there would not have been enough space for people to sit comfortably."
Now, all of the machines are available to be booked, including a large, industrial machine called a long arm.
New classes are also planned for the fall. Rug hooking, yarn and fabric dying with Jan Hook are some of them. Old favourites, like introduction to quilting with Noble and introduction to sewing with Jen Harwood, will continue.
Noble will be having a grand reopening of the shop on Saturday, July 22 starting at 10 a.m.
Along with food and drinks, the legendary Quilter On a Bike Elaine Theriault and Emily Baker – both are representatives from sewing machine brand Husqvarna Viking – will be there. One will do short tutorials on the machines for those who are interested.
More information can be found on the Sew Productive website.
