TOLEDO, Ohio (WTVG/Gray News) – A business owner in Ohio is closing her doors after being open for four decades.
Mary Cianci, the owner of Sew-N-Such, is retiring this week.
After sewing everything from wedding dresses to Junior Solheim Cup uniforms, she says she needs to call it a career.
“I really love the people. I love what I do,” Cianci said. “But I’m getting old, and the body is falling apart. I got to retire.”
The shop isn’t closing for lack of business either. In fact, it’s bustling with customers, sounds of sewing machines and laughter. But Cianci said she’s ready for a new chapter.
For the last four years, she’s worked alongside her cousin Ellen Schnapp.
“It’s been a wild ride because Mary is a unique person,” Schnapp said with a little laugh.
According to Cianci, a love of sewing runs in her family.
“My great-grandmother was a tailor, my grandmother sewed and, when I was a kid, I was always sewing,” she said. “My mother’s best friend said, ‘She’s either going to be a surgeon or a seamstress.’ I took the seamstress.”
Cianci said she’s altered clothing for multiple generations of families over the years. She’s worked on items for weddings, funerals, vacations, proms, dance recitals and more.
“It’s definitely one of those staples in the community,” Maya Cummins, the store’s manager said. “I still get calls to this day of people who don’t know we’re shutting down, and they’re like ‘Hey, can you hem my dress?’”
Cianci said she had hoped to sell the business whole and let a new seamstress take up the Sew-N-Such mantle.
“But it’s kind of a lost art,” she said.
Still, Cianci and Schnapp are encouraging others to pick up the craft.
“It’s a great hobby to have, even if you don’t do anything professionally with it,” Schnapp said. “It’s very satisfying to me to make something, create it, and say, ‘Oh, I did that.’”
While Cianci said she’s sad to say goodbye, she’s also excited.
“We call it fruit basket upset. Everything’s going to be different, which I like. It will give me something to look forward to,” she said.
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