Edgewood Garden Studio - About Us

I’ve been fascinated by fibers since I was a child. I started with knitting mittens at my Latvian grandmother’s knee. My mother and I sewed children’s clothes for an orphanage in Mexico when I was an adolescent. My father taught me the seaman’s crafts of net-making and macramé as well. As a family, we needlepointed massive tapestries and rugs. I bought my first loom and spinning wheel in the mid 1960’s when I was in college. (Yes, I am actually that old!) During the 70’s and early 80’s, I was an active teacher of spinning and weaving in several shops and crafts schools/centers. I even explored sheep raising in Australia. After some intervening years of fascination with computers, I’m back in the fiber world.

We started our Etsy shop when I broke my foot in 2011. During non-weight bearing boredom, I made piles and piles of handspun yarn. Who was going to knit or weave 180 skeins of handspun yarn? My sister-in-law suggested an Etsy shop. A what? And thus, our on-line career in fibers started. I began dying wool and silk to achieve the colors I craved for my own spinning, and found that others liked them too! We expanded our outlets to our own standalone website in 2015.

Fortunately, Mike found the business interesting as well. I spin, dye, felt, photograph, Photoshop and wrap packages. Mike mixes the dyes, does the actual listings, buys materials, keeps financial records, and runs to the post office six days a week. When we fall behind, or my back and shoulders protest too much, we have a couple of accomplices in wool (among them, our garden helpers) who give me a hand with handling heavy wet wool.

Together, Mike and I maintain (with assistance) a large strolling garden of ornamentals. Our fruit orchards and potager make up a major portion of our food. We are both avid cooks. Additionally, there are the duties of being cross-species "parents" to two German Shepherds, a dozen chickens and many large koi in our pond. I’m a bit of a second-hand Rose, who loves to refurbish, recycle, and reclaim as much as possible. We own and are restoring a few historical homes in Tacoma which we rent.

Visit our Etsy shop for Ilga's handspun and hand dyed yarns, more rovings and other goodies.

Join our group on Ravelry to chat with fans of our fibers.

We're on Instagram, where you can see Ilga's drawings, pictures from our garden and travels, and the occasional shot of our dogs.

Pinterest has more photos from our life and work.

We are not very active on Twitter, but we occasionally post product announcements there.

To see our garden, located in Edgewood, Washington, USA, visit our garden website. This hasn't been updated for quite a while, but it will give you an idea of what we have going on.

Need to reach us? Please email us at store@edgewoodgarden.com.

-- Ilga Jansons