Chelsea Quilt Shop With $59 Workshops: Keaton Quilts

Keaton Quilts is a dedicated quilt shop hidden on the sixth floor, at 150 W 28th Street, Suite 605. It sells quilting cotton by the half yard, runs $59 workshops and longarms customer quilts on site. There is no street-level sign to look for: you enter the industrial building through the main lobby's double glass doors, skip the security desk sign-in, and ride the elevator to the sixth floor.

The shop exists because the last one closed. When The City Quilter on West 25th Street shut in October 2016 after nearly two decades, Manhattan quilters lost their local source for cotton and notions. Justin Stafford, who came to New York to attend the Fashion Institute of Technology, decided to open a shop of his own in the flower district rather than let the craft drift to New Jersey and the internet.

Stafford's quilting career started with a contest. In May 2016 he took second prize in Bernina's national Quilts for Furry Friends competition, and people began asking whether he taught. He named the business after his dog at the time, Diane Keaton, for whom he had been sewing tiny booties and bed quilts. Today the shop's self-described CEO is Buster Keaton, a Yorkiepoo born in May 2021.

The resume behind the counter is long for a two-person business. Jo-Ann named Stafford a handmade hero, he became an Olfa Ambassador and Aurifil Artisan in 2018, and his quilts have hung in Saks Fifth Avenue windows. Macmillan published his beginner kit-book, Tiny World: Quilting, on July 7, 2020. It walks kids aged 10 and up through a miniature kitty quilt, which says a lot about how patient the teaching here is.

Liberty of London is the reason many visitors make the trip. The shop stocks well over a hundred Liberty prints, including quilting-weight cottons such as Wiltshire Shadow, a silhouette redraw of a 1933 leaf-and-berry design, at $7.99 per half yard. Tana Lawn sits alongside for garment sewers. FreeSpirit, Ruby Star Society, Riley Blake, Tilda and Moda fill most of the remaining shelves, so the selection leans modern rather than traditional calico.

Ruby Star Society's Speckled basics, printed in Japan, run $6.74 per half yard and make good blenders for scrappy tops. Precut buyers will find Kaffe Fassett Classics Plus five-inch charm packs at $16.49 and Liberty fat quarter bundles in 20-piece sets. For thread, Aurifil 50wt small spools cost $6.29, and the wall of colors is wide enough to match almost any binding. Ask before you pull bolts off the top shelves.

The classroom is the busiest part of the shop. Every student gets a Bernina or bernette machine, a cutting mat, a design wall, neutral thread already loaded, a padded rolling chair and an electric sit-stand desk. The flagship class is Intro to Patchwork and Quilting, $159, taught by Diana Rodgers. It includes four fat quarters and a 14-inch square of batting, and you need previous experience sewing by machine before you sign up.

Shorter workshops mostly cost $59: Easy Curves, Improv Patchwork Techniques, a binding workshop, Beginning Big-Stitch Hand Quilting with Sharon Calandra, and a monthly Dear Jane Club with Diane Schneck, built around Jane Stickle's 1863 sampler. The Dresden Baby Quilt Workshop with Stafford is $89 and sends you home with a baby-size top, helped along by a die-cut machine that cuts every petal for you.

Social Sewing is the cheapest way to borrow the room. Bring any project, use a machine and the design wall, and ask Stafford for advice: the three-hour afternoon session is $38 and the longer late-morning session is $44. Private lessons cost $99 an hour with a two-hour minimum. Refunds are only given up to 72 hours before a class, and they come back as credit toward another class, not cash.

Stafford longarms quilts in the shop himself, and you can drop a top off during store hours without an appointment. Edge-to-edge pantograph work comes in three tiers: Economy at $0.03 per square inch for quilts up to 50 by 50 inches, Medium Density from $0.045, and High Density from $0.055. Custom quilting starts at $0.07 per square inch. Any longarm or binding job carries a $75 minimum.

Prepare the layers properly or pay for it. Backing and batting must extend five inches beyond every edge of the top, the backing must be squared up, and nothing should be basted together. Press both pieces and snip loose threads before you arrive, because wrinkled tops incur fees. Quilts made from Keaton kits get 15 percent off. Longarm lessons and the promised rental program are paused after the June 2026 move, expected back around January 2027.

Hours are uneven, so plan around them. Keaton Quilts opens Tuesday 11 am to 1 pm, Wednesday 11 am to 7 pm, Thursday 11 am to 6 pm, Friday 11 am to 6 pm and Saturday 10:30 am to 5:30 pm. Sunday and Monday the shop is dark. Skip Tuesday unless you know exactly what you need, since two hours leaves little time to audition fabric against a design wall.

Wednesday evening is the sweet spot for browsing, while Saturday brings class traffic and fuller aisles. Leave pets at home: staff are allergic to fur, and the shop asks that even hair-coated dogs stay away, Buster excepted. The shop also closes on Thanksgiving, November 26, 2026, and on December 24 and 25.

West 28th Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues is the old flower district, and the wholesale stalls spill potted ferns and cut branches onto the sidewalk early in the morning. Walk a block south and west to the Museum at FIT, the free fashion museum attached to the school where Stafford studied. Its rotating costume and textile exhibitions make a natural pairing with a fabric haul.

Garment sewers who want apparel fabric rather than quilting cotton can walk ten minutes north to Mood Fabrics on West 37th Street in the Garment District, a far larger store with no quilting focus. If you were hoping for Gotham Quilts, its Midtown shop closed in November 2023 and it now sells online only, so Keaton is the Manhattan shop where you can still touch quilting cotton before you buy it.

Address: 150 W 28th Street, Suite 605, sixth floor, between Sixth and Seventh avenues. Subway: the 1 train to 28th Street or the R and W to 28th Street. Penn Station and Madison Square Garden are about an eight-minute walk. BERNINA and bernette machine purchases must be checked out separately from other items, through the shop's dedicated BERNINA web store.