A new business is open on Vineyard Haven’s Main street, and it’s not a restaurant, boutique or coffee shop. It’s The Stitchery Martha’s Vineyard.
Proprietor Kate Altman’s been telling me for a few months about her business idea. But I didn’t quite get it, so I dropped in to learn more.
Located down the pedestrian side alley next to Bunch of Grapes Bookstore, The Stitchery MV studio belies its subterranean location. It’s a surprisingly cheery space.
A thready rainbow — a wall of wooden organizers holding every imaginable hue of embroidery floss — greeted me. Just beyond, Kate sat at a round wooden table, which I soon learned was the heart of the studio. The table was surrounded by industrial-style stainless shelves, each packed with stacks of crisply folded fabric.
The studio had the vibe of a charming sewing-supply shop, but that’s not what The Stitchery MV is about. Kate’s new venture focuses on sharing skills, not selling products.
She’s been practicing needle arts for over 65 years. (She started very young, she jokes.) Now she’s bringing that knowledge to the public through private and small-group lessons. Lessons can be on anything involving a needle and thread: needlepoint, cross-stitch, embroidery. Patchwork quilting and creative clothing repair. Clothes-making too. Doll clothes. Even the doll itself, I learn.
She showed me a sample that came out of a series of classes for schoolchildren. They first envisioned the doll. Once it was made, and dressed, the kids decided it wasn’t enough. Because of course the doll goes to school. She needed a backpack and math book. Plus cookies for snack time. (A doll’s got to eat, after all.)
Kate presented more hand-stitched projects: pincushions, potholders and pillows. And two pieces in a chevron pattern: a small color-block study in vivid blue, purple, orange and yellow, and a large hand-pieced memory quilt in a soothing array of sand and cloud tones.
A few minutes in Kate’s presence and you quickly learn: If you’ve gotten even a vague notion of a fabric-related project stewing in the back of your head, Kate can help you make it happen. “I want to teach sewing skills, but also how to think about the process of creating with those skills.” That’s the difference between becoming a pianist who requires sheet music and one who transforms the tune in their head into sound.
If you’ve got a sewing machine in your attic you’d like to put to work, Kate can help there too. In fact, tackling hand-sewing and machine-sewing in conjunction is an excellent way to learn. Machine-sewing’s great for making fast progress, getting things done. But adding hand-sewn touches will make whatever you create more special. Plus, it’s a wonderful way to chill out. “It’s different when you sit down to hand-sew,” she explains. “If we’re talking about chill skills, hand-sewing is where it’s at.”
Intrigued, I looked over the variety of classes offered but still hesitated. I’m someone for whom reattaching a button neatly is a challenge. Kate thinks anyone can sew, though, and invited me to one of her small-group classes.
Kate’s breadth of professional creative experience is vast. A California native, after graduating from art school, she worked as an interior designer. And through that, she got to know German filmmaker Wim Wenders. When Wenders decided to make the film Paris, Texas, he hired Kate to be art director.
Paris, Texas won the Palme d’Or at Cannes; Kate’s career in film was launched. Except she walked away. “There were offers,” she says, “but nothing seemed like it would be the same kind of artistic, collaborative experience as it was with Wim and that crew. I felt that I’d miraculously started at the top of what I wanted to do.”
Instead, over the next several decades, she went into business. First came The Sewing Circle, a fabric shop in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, which she opened because she loved to sew but couldn’t get a decent spool of thread. When she moved to the Hudson Valley and later to the east end of Long Island, she again opened shops focused on home goods and sewing and needlework supplies “with some design consultation thrown in for good measure.”
Now she’s a Martha’s Vineyard year-round resident. Her original plan was to retire, but after a break she decided she wasn’t 100 per cent ready for that.
After I absorbed the range of Kate’s professional creative experiences, it was time to be wowed by her needle-arts expertise.
At the start of one of her classes on basic skills, she offered a handout that, in a few pages, shared information on tools and techniques and projects that can save beginners time and money. One project caught my eye: building a reference set made of small samples of different stitches on linen attached to an index card. Outlining stitches, detached stitches, special stitches with names such as Lazy Daisy, Spider Web and Herringbone. The number of stitches Kate teaches is dizzying.
But first, she had to teach me how to thread a needle (my current process involves way too much squinting and finger-poking). In the end, I required a needle-threading tool but still felt triumphant. Then I tried my hand at a variety of stitches on a piece of sample cloth. While we worked, our little group chatted about the projects we wanted to attempt and shared past experiences in sewing.
After just an hour working with Kate, I felt more accomplished and ready for more, like the class on visible mending. Now I am ready to transform that sad tear in some favorite pants into a colorful stitched flower or star.
Days are shortening, and summer visitors have left. I sense the dark of February glowering on the horizon. But now instead of thinking about sunset at 4:30 or trudging Main street in heavy boots, I think of the warmth of The Stitchery MV, that color-packed hive with its cozy round table, and how I’ll be able to while away hours learning to stitch.
Editor’s Note: Kate Altman is already planning to move The Stitchery Martha’s Vineyard to a bigger space at the corner of Union and Main streets, below The Green Room Shoe Store, starting December 2026. Until then, she’ll continue to offer classes at her current location at 19 Main.
Brenda Horrigan is a long-time Vineyard Haven resident and one of four Island writers behind the Substack The Creative Current. Read more at TheCreativeCurrent.substack.com.