Rooster Creek Company, a quilt and ice cream shop based in Holts Summit, is adding an event center near its location in Summit Plaza to host classes, retreats and quilting events.
The additional space, which owner Teresa Cuno said can fit 24 people working on quilts, has had its first class and first event, "Super Sew Sunday."
"We're really excited to have the extra space because we had run out of space (at the shop), and so now we can have more lines of fabric and we have more room for the sewing and the guild," Cuno said. "When we would have guild or we'd have class, I mean, it would just be bumper to bumper, people could hardly shop."
In Summit Plaza, the event center has been named "The Hen House," with a large colorful rooster in the front window.
The expansion also will free up space for Rooster Creek to make improvements at its main location, Cuno said. Shelving will be replaced, and the shop will be redecorated. Most importantly it allows for more fabric lines to be added.
"Ladies are always wanting new fabric," Cuno joked.
The new event center includes design walls running along two sides of the main room. About 50 feet long and 8 feet tall, quilters can pin pieces of fabric to the design walls to help assemble their quilts.
"We're also going to allow people to have events here," Cuno said. "Someone has talked to us about doing exercise classes or things similar to that, or having family reunions and things. So that's something that we haven't really set a price or anything yet, but that's in the future."
Cuno and her husband, Michael, opened the Rooster Creek Company in a smaller location almost five years ago after he retired from the military. The quilt shop now has a guild of 98 paying members and offers regular classes and events.
Rooster Creek is starting a new event with the event center called "Quilt 'til You Wilt." On the third weekend of every month, people can come from noon Friday until noon Sunday to work on their projects, staying all night if they'd like.
Cuno said the events and classes her business offers are a good opportunity to build friendships. People come from all over Mid-Missouri to quilt at Rooster Creek, she added.
Anyone interested in joining a class or the guild just has to come to the shop.
"We will help them feel like family," Cuno said.