Categories
- East Bay Area Shops
- Online Sustainable Fabric Shops
- Online Fiber & Craft Shops
- Online Filipino Hand Woven Fabric Sources
- Thrift & Consignment Shops
TLDR: Spreadsheet Link
I get it, you want to get straight to the goodies ASAP so here’s the google spreadsheet. This is updated as I come across shops & the goal is to go through it quarterly to make sure these shops are still relevant. The East Bay shops are places I’ve personally shopped at & purchased from. The other categories are a mixture of places I’ve purchased from or places I’ve found when researching that I found noteworthy. I’m not a professional reviewer, no yelp or google status & I’m not looking to be one. Leave a comment below for any recommendations & places I need to check out.
Fabric, Sewing, Arts & Craft Store Spreadsheet
East Bay Area Fabric & Craft Shops
- Discount Fabrics - Berkeley CA https://www.discountfabrics-sf.com/
- Simply Fabrics - Oakland CA https://shopsimplyfabric.com/
- Stonemountain & Daughters - Berkeley https://stonemountainfabric.com/
- Flax Art and Design - Oakland CA https://flaxart.com/
- A Verb for Keeping Warm - Oakland CA https://www.averbforkeepingwarm.com/
- Black Squirrel Yarns - Berkeley CA https://blacksquirrelberkeley.com/
- Blick Art Materials - two locations - Oakland & Berkeley CA https://www.dickblick.com
I'm based in the East Bay region of the Bay Area. My favorite way to hunt for fabric is to take a couple hours out of my day and hit up different fabric shops in the East Bay. Shopping locally is so important, by supporting small businesses we keep resources within our communities & we become less dependent on the big box stores. The curation of the inventory is usually made up of other small businesses & is so much more unique & special.
Side Note, I don’t venture out to San Francisco much, obviously there are fabric, art, craft & thrift shops there. I just need to reacquaint myself with the city again.
Sustainable Online Fabric Sources
- Spoonflower - Custom Printed Fabrics www.spoonflower.com
- Organic Cotton Plus www.organiccottonplus.com
- Vivify Textiles - US Based www.vivifytextiles.com
- Blackbird Fabrics www.blackbirdfabrics.com
- Simplifi Fabric - US Based www.simplififabric.com
- Deadstock Fabric USA www.deadstockfabricusa.com
- Fabric Wholesale Direct www.fabricwholesaledirect.com
- Green Stitch Fabrics www.greenstitchfabrics.com
- Fair Fabrics USA www.fairfabricsusa.com
- Core Fabrics https://corefabricstore.com/
In my opinion the best way to do sustainability is to reuse fabrics. Reusing & patching fabric from old garments, shopping in the linen section of thrift or consignment stores or repairing & mending clothes. I totally understand there are times when you want to make something with new fabric though, which is what the list above is for. See the list below for thrift & consignment stores in the East Bay.
Thrift & Consignment Shops: East Bay Region
- Urban Ore - Berkeley, CA https://urbanore.com/
- The ReCrafting Co. - Alameda, CA https://www.therecraftingco.com/
- East Bay Depot for Creative Reuse - Oakland, CA https://www.creativereuse.org/
Like I said, the best way to do sustainability is to use the things that are already in out in the world.. There’s no guarantee you’ll find something when you’re thrifting, but with an open mind comes the best creativity.
Online Fabric & Craft Shops
Fabric Shops
- Mood Fabrics https://www.moodfabrics.com/
- Online Fabric Store https://www.onlinefabricstore.com/
- Blue Moon Fabrics https://www.bluemoonfabrics.com/
Crafts & Notions
- Woolery https://woolery.com/
- Fiberculture https://fiberculture.co/
- Richard the Thread https://www.richardthethread.com/
- Wawak https://www.wawak.com/
This is a new & short list for me since I got too dependent on shopping at Joann Fabrics & Amazon. Please be patient with me, I promise this list will grow. Also with Tariffs being a thing nowadays finding things like zippers, buttons, notions & tools will be a little more harder & pricier.
Filipino Woven Fabric Sources
- Habi Council https://www.habiphilippinetextilecouncil.com/
- Easter Weaving Co. https://easterweavinginc.com/
- Narra Studio https://narrastudio.com/
- La Bonnie Vie https://www.instagram.com/labonnevie.ph/
- Anthill https://anthillfabrics.com/
- Shopee PH https://shopee.ph/
- La Union Weaving Mills
- Vigan Weaving Mills
So this is by far the hardest list to make. Finding Philippine woven fabrics is like a treasure hunt, there’s a lot of research involved. Especially being based in the US and now tariffs will most likely affect this. If you’re visiting the Philippines I suggest looking up weaving mills in whatever area you’re staying. A lot of these places are in neighborhoods and just look like someone’s house. I found places in La Union, Vigan. These places do have social media accounts that you should follow, sometimes they’ll post what they have in stock, but in order to buy you’ll have to directly message them. Something to note is that most of these places don't ship to the US. The logistics are not really in our favor for those of us that are stateside. I’m honestly not trying to deter you from this, I’m just trying to set realistic expectations.
Additional Resources
- Broaden your search engines, google is free, but not everyone is using SEO.
- Social media can be a really good search engine, it’s not always toxic.
- Be wary of AI, I asked the GPT for lists of resources for these things specifically with links, but found that some of the links did not work.
List Upkeep
Like I mentioned earlier, I will try to keep this list updated & make sure the places listed are still active. I’ll gladly take any recommendations, I’m always open to new resources. Especially if they’re small and/or local businesses. Leave a comment below and tell me about your favorite places to shop anything artsy, crafty or sewing related!