Feature Story: Swiss Village Quitls and Crafts

Click to Enlarge

By Dave Mast

SUGARCREEK - In a time where so many products are geared toward mass production, it is refreshing to see a business creating a beautiful piece one stitch at a time, as do the folks at Swiss Village Quilts in Sugarcreek. While their products may not hit the shelf in lightning speed by the millions, it is quality that is at the heart of what has made the company so successful.

It all begins with the flick of a wrist, the push of a needle, and painstaking time, with thousands of repetitive motions producing immaculate quilts to the exact specifications of those who put their trust in Swiss Village Amish Quilts to create for them a special and unique item perfect for their need.

"We have one thing that a lot of places don't have and that is we start all of our quilts ourselves," said owner Aden Hochstetler. "We have complete control of the fabrics, we have all of the quilters who have done this for years. These are two things that make for some fantastic quality quilts." The quilt store began in 1982, and was purchased by Hochstetler in 1994.

In addition to the quilts, the store also carries a wide variety of accessories. Because quilts and accessories may wear over the years, Swiss Village Quilts & Crafts carries its own line of fabrics to make their quilts and accessories, it can always match what they have done.

Another rarity for the store is how they create their quilts. While many quilts are designed with several quilters working to complete the project. Hochstetler said that they try to limit the number of quilters working on any given quilt to one single quilter.

"If you have a lot of quilters sitting around a quilt, you are going to get a lot of different types of stitches," said Hochstetler. "Each of them does it differently. When you pay for a quality quilt, you want something nice and uniform."

This method does not lend itself to expediency but then that is not the goal of Swiss Village Quilts.
But because the business employs between 50 and 60 quilters, they are able to manufacture quite a large number of quilts in fairly quick order.

Quilts may be specialized to fit any preference, from color and patterns to style and size. "Many people think that there are just a few sizes," said Hochstetler. "They think twin, queen and king size. That's not true. There really is no specific size because beds vary. The ability to fit a customers exact needs is important to us."

Hochstetler has seen customers bring in carpet and wallpaper samples, paint samples and many other items which people want to design their decor around. That's why they carry so many styles and patterns of fabric on hand at their two locations.

Of course if you don't want to wait to design your own quilt, you can always choose from more than 100 quilts on-hand at the stores. Among the top sellers are the Mariner Star, the Star Spin, applique quilts, a special quilt called "the Ohio Special" which Swiss Valley Quilts specializes in, and the Pineapple Quilt, which is a plain to off-white quilt with a large number of stitches. "Many of the Pineapple quilts have a tremendous number of stitches, and are quite beautiful," said Hochstetler. "There are around 375,000 stitches on some of them. That takes a lot of time but the final product is well worth it." Hochstetler said that they had donated a quilt to the Ohio Haiti Benefit Auction earlier this year which contained more than 430,000 stitches.

But the painstaking effort, precision and time spent on their quilts is all done so that each piece is as stunning and high-quality as possible. "Having everything here on hand with extremely talented and experienced quilters is so important to designing a beautiful quilt," said Hochstetler, who said that they have created quilts for people from all over the world.

Aside from the quilts and fabrics, the store also carries and makes pillows and pillow covers, wall hangings, table clothes, Amish dolls, wooden toys, crafts, as well as a large line of P. Graham Dunn products and a large supply of collectible farm toys.

You may visit Swiss Village Quilts and Crafts at one of their two locations in Sugarcreek, at 1025 W. Main St., or at 113 S. Broadway. To call for information or directions, or to place an order, call them at 330-852-4855. They are open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.