Castle yarn – visit to Ewe Felty Thing

Whenever I think about Wales, castles and beaches are never far from my mind – and Nikki, the owner of North Wales yarn shop Ewe Felty Thing, has managed to have a shop right next to both of these!  Back in 2020, before the pandemic lockdowns which changed our lives forever, I went out to see her at Ewe Felty Thing when the shop was based in Llandudno, a popular seaside town with long sandy beaches on both sides of a promontory, a pier, Punch and Judy … it was a busy place!

Now, four years and what feels like a lifetime later, Nikki has moved premises and location to Conwy, another seaside town just a few miles down the road from Llandudno which also has a beautiful sandy beach – and a castle!

It was a dismal day at the beginning of December as I drove into Conwy but Conwy Castle, over 700 years old and still with its battlements intact, is an amazing sight to see as you drive across the bridge into the town, and an even more fabulous sight right next to the castle on Castle Street is … Ewe Felty Thing!

Nikki and her partner Andy look very proud of themselves and so they should be – this photo was taken on opening day and it was incredible to see the work that had been done in a short space of time to turn this lovely old bank building into a wonderful space for a yarn shop.

Would you like to have a look around?

To the right of the main entrance door is the shop.  It’s light and spacious and absolutely filled with yarn …

There is pretty much every kind of yarn here that you could need, no matter what project you intend to start.  Nikki sells a good range of commercial brand yarn – West Yorkshire Spinners, John Arbon, Rowan, Juniper Moon Farm – and more hand-dyed yarn than you can shake a stick at.  You can see it all down one wall, skeins and skeins of it in the most beautiful squishy rainbow, all colours and weights – oh, you are really spoilt for choice!

Nikki supports a LOT of indie dyers (she’s a dyer herself so appreciates the time and effort that goes into producing the yarns) and you can find Abercairn Yarns, All Wool That Ends Wool, Bear in Sheep’s Clothing, Burrow and Soar, Cat and Sparrow, Dina’s Home of Crafts, Ewe Felty Thing, Handmade by Joe, Hey Jay, Knitter Scarlet, Occasional Purl, Sionnach Yarns, The Woolly Tangle, Truly Hooked, Woo! and Woolly Wumpkins all displayed in their full glory along that wall.

But there’s more!  The old bank vault has turned into a knit n natter space, there’s a small kitchen area right outside the huge metal vault door (don’t worry, no knitters are left in the shop overnight) so that you are never far away from your next brew, and across from the main shop is a workshop area that is going to be used for a wide range of workshops – you can book onto those now through the Arterium Hub – there are classes for crochet, felting, loom weaving, Dorset buttons, craft and chat sessions … there’s already plenty of choice and considering that the shop only opened at the beginning of December, it’s definitely a promise of great things to come!

Now, you don’t just have to be a knitter or crocheter to want to visit Ewe Felty Thing – Nikki is also passionate about spinning and Ewe Felty Thing is the North Wales stockist for Ashford wheels and equipment.

There are all kinds of spinning wheels for you to try out, from the traditional type with the big wheel (they always make me think of Wales – you can see one in the back right of the photo) to more modern-looking wheels and even travelling versions so that if you are someone hooked on spinning, you don’t need to leave the house without your wheel!  I do like the idea of learning how to spin, but it feels like another rabbit hole that I don’t have the spare time to start disappearing down so I have resisted … but when the day comes that I do want to find out more about it, then Nikki will be the person to speak to.  She offers advice, lessons and spinning wheel fittings so that you can make sure that you buy the right one for you – they’re a bit of an investment so you’d want to get it right!

If you are a spinner or a felter, there is a big range of fleece to spin or felt with …

The stand in the centre is crammed with hand-dyed fleece rovings, there are whole sheep fleeces to the right of the photo if you’re someone who likes to prepare your own fleece, and more rovings over on the display units behind.  It’s not something that every yarn shop has space for or chooses to sell as, after all, they need to stock what their customers want, but it makes life so much easier if you are someone who uses rovings to be able to see and feel them for yourself before you buy.

Right at the back of the photo are woven blankets for sale, so if the weaving and spinning part isn’t for you, you can still own something wonderfully snuggly and handmade without the effort!

It wouldn’t be one of my blog posts if I didn’t mention sock yarn at any point so let’s head back over to the front of the shop.

This was my spec for the day, right by the door (and the heater) with my mug of tea and the opportunity to accost encourage everyone who came through the door to have a good look at the yarns and especially the sock yarns 🙂

There’s a really good selection of West Yorkshire Spinners Signature 4ply to choose from – the Christmas colours in the photo above (it was December when I visited!), and a lot more around the corner including Winwick Mum yarns (thanks, Nikki!) …

There really is everything you could need to get started on any project in the shop – yarn, needles (Lykke and KnitPro), project bags, stitch markers, knitting and crochet accessories, buttons, beads, local gifts and soap … it’s a great place to go for any knitter anyway, and I spoke to lots of knitters who were delighted that they had a new local yarn shop to visit, but Conwy is also a really good place for a day out too.  There’s the harbour with the smallest house in the UK, the medieval walls to walk around, walks further out to the marina and beyond, a lovely beach (do be careful of the tides, though), fish and chip shops, ice cream, souvenirs and, of course, the castle.  We’ve had some really good days out in and around Conwy, and I can highly recommend it as a place to visit.

And no visit to Wales is ever complete without a souvenir to bring home – when I was little, it was always seaside rock (I found this video of it being made – amazing!) or perhaps a small animal made out of shells (I had a good collection of shells with googly eyes stuck to them!).  Nowadays, with more respect for our teeth and running out of shelf space for googly-eyed shell creatures, we knitters are much more likely to choose yarn as a souvenir and where better to procure that than a stone’s throw away from one of the best-preserved medieval castles in Europe?

Now that sounds like a grand day out to me!

Ewe Felty Thing, 24 Castle Street, Conwy, LL32 8AY

www.ewefeltything.co.uk

Thank you very much to Nikki, Andy and Wendy for looking after me so well!