We made it! Two busy and eventful weekends are behind us. Here's a little recap of what we've experienced.

On March 28th we started for Cologne with bag and baggage and very heavy suitcases. As always, we had a joint stand with AU Ver a Soie from Paris, the manufacturer of our silk yarns. The stand was prepared, we only had to put our embroidery pictures on the wall. As every year, Au Ver a Soie opted for a black wall covering, on which the silk shines particularly beautifully.

Cologne is purely a trade fair that is not intended for the end consumer. The whole world really meets here. Unfortunately, the embroidery sector was totally underrepresented this year. We definitely have the feeling that more people are embroidering again and that customers are looking for interesting embroidery templates and good materials, but unfortunately the trade fair did not reflect this trend at all. Every year we always go to Cologne curiously, hoping to get to know new and interesting designers. Unfortunately, when it came to embroidery, we were alone with Oehlenschläger, DMC and Permin! What is of course also noticeable: there are fewer and fewer good handicraft shops whose competent owners know exactly what they want and how the industry ticks. A clear loss!

Nevertheless, like every year, it was wonderful to work together with Marc and Nathalie from Au Ver a Soie, we made many interesting contacts, had a great trade fair party and went home with renewed energy and new ideas.

The Nadelmarkt in Iserlohn-Barendorf has a completely different character, a small but fine event that is lovingly planned and organized by the Iserlohn Museums every year. This year we were rewarded with bright sunshine, which made the two-day hustle and bustle around Textiles in this museum village even more beautiful. All of the following photos were provided to us by the Iserlohn Museums! Copyright: Jan R. Schäfer. Thanks a lot for this!

And now some impressions to enjoy:

The laundry is already flapping promisingly in the sun, fastened with the oversized clothes pegs by carpenter Konrad Horsch.

Because of the nice weather, many exhibitors simply spread out their goods in the sun. It couldn't be nicer!

The large inner courtyard between the houses invited people to linger and chat over food and drink.

But there was also a lot going on in the houses. The Ennigerloh Embroidery Museum was again present with a very fine collection of exhibits and showed live demonstrations of Schwalm embroidery.

At the milliner's, traditional and daring headgear could be tried on immediately, which the ladies took advantage of in abundance.

And we - the workshop for historical embroidery patterns - stood in our usual place, as we do every year. Of course, our embroidered color chart for selecting the colors of the Soie d'Alger silk yarn could not be missing.

The "colors of Venice" had found a nice place in the window as a cushion.

And of course the contact with the customers should not be missing! Even if they are so small!

Ute strives for every potential embroiderer.

If you want more: Hopefully there will be another needle market next year. We will inform you in good time and announce the date.