May 8, 2017

Meet Claudia Purgason of Yarn Rhapsody in Gainesville

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Claudia Purgason.

Claudia, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
When I was 10 years old, my mom taught me how to knit. I will never forget my first knitting project. It was garter stitch bag in yellow and burgundy red, very 70s. The bag was a simple rectangle, folded and seamed together on the sides, garter stitch in yellow and the handle was a twisted cord in the burgundy with huge tassels.

As I said, very 70s. From the very beginning, my mom taught me how important it is to fix your mistakes. I would go to school and when I come home my knitting project was smaller. She would take out the rows that had a mistake and let me start over. At some point, I started hiding my knitting, without much luck because I shared a room with my sister and we lived in a small apartment. But I am thankful today because she made me a better knitter by showing me how to fix my mistakes and teach me all she knows about knitting. She is my Elizabeth Zimmermann. “Practice makes perfect.”

I was born and raised in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria, Germany, about thirty minutes from the Austrian border. A place where you would have snow for six months from October to March, sometimes up to eight feet. As you can imagine, my sister, my brother and I had a lot of knitted items in our closets – sweater, hats, scarves, mittens, socks. My dad is a tailor and we also had a lot of hand sewn clothes. Since I grew up in a very crafty household, we kids kept busy with knitting, crocheting, needlepoint, weaving, beading, woodcarving and we spent a lot of time outdoors.

In 2000, I followed one of my dreams and moved to the United States, to the Northern suburbs of Atlanta, GA. Living in the U.S., my knitting has taken on new dimensions. In Germany knitting has always been very utilitarian, you need socks, you knit socks. In the U.S., knitting is very social, you go out to knit, to a coffee shop, to a yarn shop, you travel to knitting conventions, like the Sock Summit, Stitches South, Vogue Knitting LIVE.

Techniques such as felting and lace have joined my old favorites, and a few years ago I added spinning and dying yarn to my repertoire.

I teach knitting and crocheting at my shop, I design my own patterns and I have a pattern published in “Son of Stitch ’N Bitch” by Debbie Stoller. My pattern is a sock classic called “Tubey”.

At the beginning of 2013, my two biggest dreams – having a baby and owning a yarn store – became reality. Gunnar Lang Purgason was born on August 3, 2013 and has been our shop mascot and model extraordinaire ever since.

Has it been a smooth road?
Nothing is ever a smooth road. When you are business owner, mother, wife, you wear a lot of hats and you have a lot of jobs to accomplish. Time management is very important, especially when you own the business by yourself, and you are in charge of buying the toilet paper to creating the website and making your business, in my case, a local yarn shop, a customer experience.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with Yarn Rhapsody – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
My business, Yarn Rhapsody, is a local yarn store. I offer supplies for knitting, crocheting, weaving and spinning. Yarn, knitting needles, crochet hooks, gadgets. Yarn Rhapsody is known for its excellent customer service and warm and welcoming atmosphere at the shop. There is a big table in the center of the shop that serves the knitting and crocheting community to gather and exchange experiences. I also offer classes for knitting and crocheting, as well as private lessons and finishing services for customer projects. Yarn Rhapsody is the only local yarn shop within a 50-mile radius north of Atlanta. You can’t compare us with any kind of the big chain store like Michaels, Joanns and Hobby Lobby. We have all three stores within 2 miles of the shop and it’s not hurting our business at all.

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
Gainesville is a smaller city north of Atlanta, GA. I love that it’s small and close to the mountains.

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