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Another bit of old Boston gets ripped out: Windsor Button to shut down

By adamg on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 2:53pm

The Downtown Boston Business Improvement District tweets that Windsor Button, 35 Temple Pl., starts a going-out-of-business sale on Feb. 11. It first opened in 1936.

Neighborhoods: 
Downtown
Topics: 
Business


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Comments

By Crafting shop starved Bostonia... on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 3:36pm.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

By Subway Knitter on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 10:25am.

I heard about this yesterday, and I was bereft.

I might have to make a trip up there for one last shop.

Boo greedy landlords...curses on you and your children.

By A very sad knitter on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 3:52pm.

Now where will I get my buttons?! and where will I get a yarn fix on my lunch break?! This is awful!

By anon on Wed, 04/10/2013 - 1:22pm.

TRY WINMILL FABRICS, FABRIC PLACE BASEMENT, PLAYTIME AND MANY MORE!

By Kathode on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 3:54pm.

They had a great variety of yarns, notions and the most amazing button collection. It's really the only shop left in Downtown Crossing from my childhood. What a huge loss. I'm sure some bar or restaurant will move in.

By Sally on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 10:17am.

I think you'll be right.

By anon on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 4:03pm.

100% worst news ever. Every time something I've loved forever closes, I think to myself, "someday, this will happen to Windsor Button, and then I will weep bitter, bitter tears." And now it's happening!!!!!!!!!!!! :(

By anon on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 4:11pm.

Aside from Windmill Fabrics does Boston proper still have any crafting, hobby, knitting, sewing, model railroad type shops left?

By Miss Modular on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 6:38pm.

Grey's Fabric at 450 Harrison is definitely worth checking out. Great selection of fabrics, but far smaller selection of notions than Windsor. Well, I think every other store has a far smaller selection than Windsor Button...

By johnmcboston on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 9:03am.

It's the notions I'll miss. the little stuff that you don't realize you're out of until you need them. A short trip to Windsor is a lot nicer than a major hike to ac moore... Doubly sad that this due to a plain old rent increase. Like we need another expensive restaurant...

By anon on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 9:22am.

I don't know if you mean downtown by Boston Proper, but in JP a store opened recently called Knit & Stitch, they do workshops and such

http://jpknitandstitch.com/

By Sally on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 11:51am.

And Greys and Gather and the other crafty/sewing stores that have opened recently. But Windsor Button was a classic and for most of us a nice connection with our mothers and grandmothers who shopped here back when everyone made their own clothing on a regular basis.

By JohnAKeith on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 4:25pm.

No one.

By MassMouse on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 4:40pm.

I can honestly say my grandmother, mother and all of my aunts shopped there. My Mom would make special trips back here to Boston (from NJ) to shop there. This just STINKS!!

By massmarrier on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 4:51pm.

I don't need them until I need them...and then I really need them. They have it all.

Plus, you can combine a trip there with a drink or two or three at Stoddard.

Sigh.

By bostonzest on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 5:11pm.

And, this comes at a time when people are beginning to learn to do things for themselves to save money. I'll miss them.

By Charles Bahne on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 11:15am.

Speaking of old Boston stores... where did that eating and drinking spot get their name?

Stoddard's cutlery store, of course. The web says they still have a store in the Nonantum section of Newton.

From a recent Yelp review (according to Google): "If Stoddard's ever goes out of business then Boston is far worse for it."

By anon on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 11:20am.

I remember when the Stoddard restaurant you are referring to was Stoddards Cutlery, a downtown Boston institution for years. When they left Temple Place (not all that long ago, really) the restaurant that took over kept the name.

By Bummed in Boston on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 5:30pm.

Life is so unfair!!

By Michael on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 5:31pm.

1) I hate it anytime a unique local place goes away

2) I just got my Mom a gift certificate for her birthday, and now she's got to come in from far flung Central Mass if she can schedule around the snow :(

By Googie Baba on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 5:46pm.

This is terrible news. I learned to knit at Windsor Button. They had a workshop every Wednesday. You could just drop in and knit away.

By Sally on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 6:45pm.

I remember being unimpressed by the selection of knitting supplies just a few years ago--very old school, acrylics, etc. and then they brought in all of this wonderful yarn--I wonder if it wasn't just a little too late? Still just so sad to see this place go.

By Subway Knitter on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 10:28am.

Then it was clearly more than "a few" years since you last visited. In the past decade or so, Windsor Button became a great combination of the old-school bad acrylic stuff (which, yeah, every once in a while you need) with the more upscale yarns.

By Sally on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 11:54am.

Their recent yarn selection was fantastic (compared to the old, fairly scant selection) and they seem to have created a nice community for knitters as well.

By Nonymouse on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 1:20pm.

I loved their yarn selection, the helpful staff and the classes as well. I took a tatting class there a few years ago, something I'd never seen offered anywhere else. My great-grandmother tatted some beautiful linens that have been passed down in my family, but no one ever learned the skill from her. I was so happy to finally be able to fix some her pieces and make new ones.

Really sad to see Windsor go.

By Miss Modular on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 6:21pm.

Awful, awful news. I hate being forced into Jo-Ann's with their sub-par buttons and notions selection. Windsor Button, you will be deeply missed.

By Sally on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 6:43pm.

What a great place. It really is starting to feel as if the Downtown that I grew up with is completely gone.

By anon on Thu, 02/07/2013 - 11:30pm.

These complainers should zip it.

By adamg on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 11:03am.

Erin McDonald, who writes Knitting in Beantown is, as you might expect, not very happy:

I feel like someone just punched me in the gut, I am breathless and incredibly sad. I know some of you may think this borders on melodramatic.... go ahead, judge me, because I will be guilty as charged.

By Constant Knitter on Fri, 02/08/2013 - 11:08am.

Say it ain't so!