Belmont resident Jo-Ann Spera and her sister, Cheryl, had been talking almost daily about opening a business together when Spera’s daughter came up with the idea for a knitting cafe.
“I haven’t knit in like 40 years, but my daughter picked it up when she was in college,” Spera said. “A lot of kids in college are knitting now, because they’re trying to keep off their phones. It sort of was a way for them to slow down and sit with other people and socialize. You can socialize and knit, but you can’t knit and use your phone.”
After a trip to Denmark with her daughter for a vacation that doubled as a bit of a reconnaissance trip, Spera discovered the success of combining coffee and retail.
“They integrate those two things,” she said. “I thought, ‘Boy, this really works.’”
With that, Spera saw an opportunity for her and her sister to launch their own cafe-retail business right here in Belmont.
“We realized there was nothing over on the East Coast here that really did anything like this so we thought it was a great opportunity to start it,” she said.
According to a press release, the team recently signed a commercial lease agreement with The Hamilton Company for the 1,347-square-foot retail space at 55 Brighton St., to open their new cafe and yarn shop, The Woolly Brew.
“We’re looking for a big community space for not only people that will be crafting, but people that are just having coffee and something to eat, or picking up things to go and go off to work,” Spera said.
Spera’s daughter, who grew up in Belmont and attended Belmont schools, is helping her mom and aunt to decide which products to bring in and offering input on how to design the space; Cheryl, meanwhile, is bringing her eye for design and her project management experience from her years of work at the tech company IBM, and Spera—of her family’s business Jon-Son Associates neighboring the cafe— is bringing her background in finance and accounting.
About eight part-time employees will staff the cafe and yarn shop, Spera said.
The cafe will serve tea and coffee from Brewster-based Snowy Owl, and a selection of baked goods from a variety of cafes in eastern Massachusetts, including The Gingerbread Construction Co in Winchester, Chococoa Baking Co. & Cafe in Newburyport, and Lakon Bakery in Brighton. The menu will include everything from sweet and savory croissants to whoopie pies.
“This end of Brighton Street really has nothing other than Comella’s,” Spera said, adding the hope is to attract commuters as well as Belmont High School students.
Spera said the goal is to also offer some classes, but those will be heavily based on demand.
“I’ve had a lot of people that have offered to do classes, either a beginning knitting class or crocheting class,” she said, adding she’s hoping to offer seasonal classes — Halloween, Thanksgiving, and around the holidays, when people are looking to make gifts for their loved ones.
For more complicated projects and experienced crafters, there may be group quilting projects. But in general, the sisters want the space to be a place for people to come in for coffee or a treat, yarn, and, if they need guidance on a project, support from a fellow patron who may be able to help.
Yarn will be sourced partly from a knit shop in Denmark — Knitting for Olive — but also from Toil and Trouble in Salem, where the yarn is hand-dyed, she said.
“We’re trying to do as much local as possible with that Denmark twist to things,” she said.
The shop and cafe will be open Monday through Friday, 6:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m.
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