I’ve been trying to find the best words to describe the open house that Ridgely, the artist behind Astral Bath Yarns, hosted this past Saturday in her Portland, Maine, studio. I think it could most accurately be described as one of her frenzied Etsy updates come to life, with the advantage of seeing her beautiful colorways in person and no worries about getting cart-jacked (unless you have short arms, in which case all bets were off). It was overwhelming, but in a good way, and everyone left happy and satisfied, both with their impulse buys and the preorders that Ridgely packed up in red bags, complete with stitch markers made by Jayla, who came up from NYC to help out.
The event, which was tagged #portlandcon on Instagram, was a con in the best sense of the word. We yarn geeks got together and did our thing, spending a wonderful time with friends who speak our language. Ridgely was so gracious in opening up her lovely home/workspace to us, and her fella also provided a delicious spread after the Yarnmarket Sweep in the front room. She is such a warm, funny person, with a fantastic taste in music (I could spend nearly as much time looking at her CD collection as I could petting her yarn).
Pictures are definitely the best way to capture this Day of Yarny Goodness:
You’ll be learning a little bit more about Ms. Astral Bath next week. Ridgely also sent me home with a skein she dyed up especially for a giveaway!
