Have you ever been to a fabric workshop? I am in absolute heaven as soon as I walk through the door:

Look! Everywhere you turn there are more fabric books to look at:

I love, love looking through all the books. Most fabric workrooms are open and available ‘to the trade’ only, meaning that you need to show identification as well as a state identification sales tax number. Each state has different requirements to obtain a sales Id number. If you are interested in obtaining, I would call your state tax office to inquire. At this particular workroom in Providence, RI, you must be ‘in the trade’ to browse here and purchase fabric.

Why go through the bother of visiting and purchasing from a workroom? For a few good reasons – not only do you get to pay wholesale cost which is considerably lower than the retail price, but you are able to see the latest and hottest fabric trends and colors, you can also borrow any books for a few days to bring home and you can order fabric samples right there quickly and easily! How great is that!

Each fabric workshop is unique in that each have their own fabric collections that they represent. This shop had Kravet, Duralee, Robert Allen,  Carole and many others. I seem to always be drawn to the Duralee fabrics because of all the great colors and patterns they use. This fabric below (and above) is from the new collection of Eileen Kathryn Boyd. So gorgeous!:

The reason for my visit this particular day was to look at fabric for window treatments for a client’s dining room. I had to work with this fabric below that was on her chairs:

I actually had a good idea of what I was looking for and I found rather quickly:

And then I was able to relax and browse through a few books for ideas, inspiration and fun! Here were two of my favorite books I brought home:

I love this blue fabric:

Another project I am working on is refinishing a old hope chest. I think I will use this fabric for the top. Don’t you just love it?

So if you would love to browse through fabric books, you should check out your local fabric workroom. Have you ever been to a workshop? Do you enjoy going?

If you need help finding the perfect fabric that goes with the perfect wall color, contact me today.

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