Somewhere over the rainbow lies a cozy shop bursting with color. Rainbows, elusive and fading into an end we never can quite locate, can be found at Colorful Stitches Fine Yarn in Merchant’s Square in Colonial Williamsburg.
With a vibrant array of yarns for knitting a colorful scarf for your little leprechaun or crocheting a warm shawl for your grandmother, the prices certainly don’t require handing over your pot of gold.
Originally founded in Lenox, Massachusetts, in 1993, Colorful Stitches was relocated to Williamsburg in 2025. Purchased from the original owner in 2007, current owner Bonnie J. Burton was visiting the shop asking for advice about opening her own yarn shop. The original owner offered her the chance to buy the existing shop and Burton quickly agreed.
Originally from Alexandria, Virginia, Burton was the first of her family to leave Virginia. She travelled extensively by means of corporate America with her husband, visiting New Mexico, Idaho, Minnesota and Massachusetts. With a degree in communications, art and design from Virginia Commonwealth University, Burton has a long love of textiles, knitting and designing window displays and 3D knitted artwork.
Knitting since the age of four, Burton visited D.C. with her grandmother and fell in love with the window displays that not only told a story, but also provided bright colors that drew her in. “Window displays should be playful and fun,” Burton observes. After breaking an ankle, she had plenty of free time to develop her 3D knitted art. In 2013, Burton knitted a complete pumpkin patch for Vogue magazine. Today, her knitted art can be seen in the window displays at her shop.
For every season there is a time to knit — apples for winter, tulips for spring and pumpkins with cornstalks and baskets of chrysanthemums for fall. Burton’s unique knitted display of a basket full of apples even includes a partially consumed apple core. One window display features 19 plates of food, and this year she will knit a display celebrating the 250th anniversary of the founding of our country.
Burton’s displays, and indeed all knitted and crocheted gifts, should be made with fine yarns and quality tools. “Buy the best yarn your budget can afford,” Burton says. Long an advocate of natural yarns and avoiding materials that contain petrochemicals, Colorful Stitches is amply stocked with wool, silk, alpaca, llama, cotton, linen, mohair, angora rabbit, eucalyptus, pineapple and even buffalo yarn. Buttons, needles and patterns round out a well stocked, colorful and enticing array that even the most penny-pinching knitter or crocheter would find hard to resist.
Walk-ins can get much needed advice — how to do short rows for example or why your stitches look twisted — from the experienced knitters and crocheters in the shop. Visiting designers offer workshops and the shop holds Knitting 911 and Crocheting 911 courses. eNewsletters keep customers up to date, while the online store offers occasional web specials. High quality assistance is always available while smaller touches such as winding yarns from hanks make Colorful Stitches a an exceptional shop to visit.
Burton has attempted nearly every hobby imaginable from weaving and making soap to sewing and beading. Clients throughout Hampton Roads will be glad she settled on knitting and fine yarns, providing them with a perpetual rainbow that can be discovered simply by entering the shop.
TO THE POINT:
Colorful Stitches Fine Yarn
Address: 409 W. Duke of Gloucester St., Williamsburg, VA, 23185
Contact: Bonnie J. Burton, owner
Phone: 757-808-5326
Email: sales@colorfulstitches.com
Website: ColorfulStitches.com
Facebook: facebook.com/colorfulstitchesyarn
