The Crafter’s Library, located at 9 East Figueroa Street, is the newest resident of downtown’s La Arcada shopping mall, taking over the former location of Peanuts Maternity & Kids. It’s a large space with windows all around and dedicated crafting areas. “I can’t overstate how much I want this to become a community space,” said owner Andrew Rawls. “It’s big; it’s bright; it’s unique.”
Rawls graduated from UCSB in 2012 and then lived in Washington D.C., where he ran a business conducting luxury tours of the city. In 2019, he moved to U.S. Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands, and he served as a youth director for children of active-duty service members and contractors. “I knew I always wanted to come back to Santa Barbara, though,” he said.
His boss in the Marshall Islands was a seamstress who loved to quilt and sew, and she taught Rawls how to do it, too. “Being on a tiny island with not a lot else to do, I would go to her room and sew for a couple of hours at a time,” he said. “It was cathartic, and I really loved doing that.”