Maria and I drove to the Noble Town Fiberworks in Hillsdale, New York this morning to meet Lewis Cleale, a successful Broadway Actor (he performs in NYC most days of the week. We’re thinking about bringing our wool there. Lewis works at the mill on Mondays and has a staff there all week.

Maria is speaking for herself on her blog, even as I write this, I’ll leave the wool and yarn stuff for her.

I love seeing Maria and the yarn people talk, I don’t follow much of what they say, but I do know the yarn project has become a successful and important part of life on the farm. The sheep earn their keep and a lot of yarn lovers love the yarn. Maria loves to raise it, clean it, and sell it.

Our long-time mill in Brandon, Vt. has shut down. We’ll miss them.

Ironically, the mill is on our street, which runs from Canada to New York City. It took us about 90 minutes to get there on the same road, it was a straight line all the way.

Hillsdale is a wealthy and beautiful boom town in fashionable Columbia County, a magnet for the wealthy from Manhattan.  One billionaire in town is building a brewery.

We aren’t in the upper class, but Lewis was a lot of fun and made us very comfortable. I took my photos with the monochrome, Maria has hers in color. The sheep and the wool and yarn are very important to us.

I enjoyed meeting Cleave, he’s a genuinely nice person, especially for a Broadway Star.

He showed Maria several new possibilities to think about and he put us on his list, which is a good thing. We haven’t figured out what the cost is to bring our wool to his new and very beautiful mill, we have to make sure we can afford it.

We felt very comfortable with Lewis, Maria’s head was spinning with ideas, and she barely spoke on the way home (not usual). So it isn’t final, but it did feel creative, exciting, and good. For the details, hop on over to Maria’s website.

I  very much loved the wool I saw at Noble Town, and Lewis is committed to the mill and has all kinds of ideas for making wool even more fun and interesting.

I’m not knowledgeable enough to evaluate the place, I just loved watching Maria talk yarn with somebody who has lots of good ideas to give back.

The decision, depending on cost, is hers. She is careful about keeping her costs low for her followers.

Lewis showed us some of the new things he’s working on, including yarn rugs we haven’t seen before. Maria is thoughtful and cautious about the wool we get, she’s pretty happy with what she does now but is always open to some new ideas. She got a bunch today.

 

 

Some of the new ideas Lewis is working on in the Noble Town Mill. Maria has some thinking to do.

 

Checking out a rope carpet.