There’s a knack to custom tailoring, and Kay Shea has it.
She started sewing at the age of 11 and began getting paid to do custom sewing and alterations by the time she was 24.
For more than two decades it’s been her bread and butter here, at her small but adequate corner shop on the “S” curve.
“It’s absolutely a lost art,” Shea said on a busy Friday afternoon, typically her busiest day. “Tailoring is not just sewing a seam, it’s knowing how to adjust the garment to fit the individual.”
Shea started her business here in 1994 when she purchased her first shop, a mobile home on Hickory Street, from well-known custom tailor Eula Shelton, who was retiring. Shea and her husband, Dan, built a respectable customer base there. He helped out at the shop when he wasn’t working at a local cabinet shop, and had also learned most of the trade. After his sudden death in 2002 Kay stepped back and took a few months off to decide her future. But she soon found that her work here was the best thing for her.
“I soon realized that I needed Salem as much as Salem needed me.”
Shea reopened her shop – Kay’s Tailoring -- and five years ago relocated to its present location on the “S” curve. She operates the only store-front custom tailoring and alteration shop around. She has customers from surrounding towns and some out-of-state customers often ship her custom work. She regularly sees 10-15 customers come through her shop door each business day needing some type of tailoring or garment alteration.
Shea said she learned the custom tailoring trade from her step-mother, Jean Hamilton, of Collinsville, Ill.
“She knew her stuff,” Shea said. “She taught me all the valuable skills needed to do custom tailoring.”
Shea said not too many people can buy off the rack and find clothes that fit. Manufacturers make clothing generically, and everyone is different.
Shea said her most profitable tailoring work is hemming pants, and she does a lot of it. But she enjoys a majority of her work. She also made all of her varied sizes of table-top ironing boards she uses to press seams of tailored garments.
“We came here from Illinois on a leap of faith, with no jobs,” Shea said. “Dan wanted to move to this beautiful area after we visited here, and he loved to hunt and fish. When I was trying to decide what I could do to make a living, he told me to do what I know best, and it’s been a real ministry for me. My customers help me get through tough times, and I help them through my handiwork.”
Shea has a grown daughter, and she visits family and friends in Illinois, but she also considers her customers her family, too.
“It’s been a good 20 years,” Shea said. “I feel blessed to have been accepted by the people here, and I have no plans to go anywhere anytime soon.”
Business hours at her shop are 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Wednesday-Friday. She can be reached at 247-8892.
