The Velvet Mill End-of-Season Indoor Sidewalk Sale
The Velvet Mill End-of-Season Indoor Sidewalk Sale takes over the sprawling Stonington mill September 19 and 20, as participating merchants move sale and clearance merchandise out of their shops and into the hallways for a building-wide weekend of browsing.
The idea is essentially a sidewalk sale without having to worry about the sidewalk.
Instead of setting up along Bayview Avenue, businesses throughout the historic Velvet Mill will place markdowns, clearance merchandise, and special finds immediately outside their doors. Shoppers can wander through the building, discovering sales as they go.
And “wander” is the appropriate word.
The Velvet Mill is now home to dozens of independent businesses, with an unusually eclectic retail mix that includes antiques, vintage clothing and furniture, art, jewelry, home décor, books, bicycles, crystals, paper goods, handmade products, food, beer and rum.
Organizers recommend coming early for the best selection.
Here’s What You’ll Find Around the Mill
The Velvet Mill has not published a definitive list identifying exactly which tenants will participate in the sidewalk sale. Here is a list of all of the businesses.
Vintage, Antiques and Collectibles
This is probably the strongest shopping category for anyone who likes hunting rather than knowing exactly what they’re going to buy.
21st Century Antiques deals in antiques and estate items and also handles estate sales and online estate auctions.
a little something is a vintage shop combining older pieces with merchandise selected to work in contemporary homes.
Epoch Destiny Boutique specializes in collectibles, antiques and vintage merchandise.
Fun and Funky Vintage lives up to its name with vintage furniture, housewares, lighting, artwork and smaller decorative finds.
Granary Farmhouse Antiques takes a more refined approach, concentrating on antique furniture and carefully selected pieces for the home.
Victoria Clare Vintage is another vintage seller and collector operating from the Mill.
Unit 88 specializes in vintage and nautical merchandise, an appropriate combination about a mile from Stonington Harbor.
Balls of Yarn mixes new, vintage, upcycled and consigned merchandise rather than fitting neatly into a single category.
Stevie T’s Treasure Tent adds another treasure-hunting stop to the building.
Books & Collectibles is exactly what its name suggests, adding used and collectible books and other finds to the mix.
For a clearance event, these may be some of the most interesting shops because “sale merchandise” doesn’t necessarily mean last season’s mass-produced inventory.
At the Velvet Mill, it could mean something that hasn’t been in season for 50 years.
Clothing, Jewelry and Things to Wear
The Mill also has several boutiques and makers selling fashion and accessories.
Valomie Boutique offers women’s clothing, accessories and gift items.
Mountain Hollow combines jewelry and accessories with botanicals, rocks and minerals, books, home décor, T-shirts and nature-inspired goods.
Nomad’s Novelties sells handmade and novelty merchandise through its Mill studio and online shop.
There are also individual artists and makers throughout the building whose work can include wearable art and handcrafted pieces.
That’s part of what makes the sale different from a conventional shopping-center clearance event. A significant amount of what’s sold inside the Mill comes from small independent sellers rather than national brands.
Furniture and Home Décor
If you’re looking for something larger, the Mill has that covered too.
Bali Bungalow specializes in handmade furniture and natural home décor.
Handcrafted Homestead Furniture produces handcrafted furniture from its Mill workshop.
Fun and Funky Vintage overlaps this category with vintage furniture, lighting, housewares and artwork.
Granary Farmhouse Antiques offers antique and vintage furniture and decorative pieces with a more traditional farmhouse aesthetic.
Interior Connections works in interior design and furnishings.
This is one category where a clearance sale could get interesting quickly. Furniture and décor occupy space, and end-of-season events give retailers an obvious reason to make room for incoming inventory.
Rocks, Crystals and Nature-Inspired Finds
Mountain Hollow deserves its own category.
The South Studios shop began with rocks and minerals and has grown into a broader nature-oriented store offering polished and natural stones, crystals, botanicals, jewelry, books, décor, clothing and wellness-oriented merchandise.
It’s one of those shops where “I’m just going to look around for five minutes” is an optimistic prediction.
Art Is Everywhere
The Velvet Mill isn’t simply a collection of stores.
It’s also one of southeastern Connecticut’s larger concentrations of working artists and galleries.
Stonington Gallery and Park Fine Art provide traditional gallery stops.
Allgood Studios & Gallery combines gallery space with a creative agency and an arcade.
Black Star Studio is an artist studio.
Other painters, designers and independent artists maintain working spaces throughout the building, including Mystic Rose Decorative Painting and a number of individual studios.
That means shoppers walking the sale can move from vintage merchandise and clothing into original art without ever leaving the building.
Paper Goods, Stickers and Handmade Pieces
Shuttle Press & Bindery has been operating since 2014 and produces handcrafted paper goods using traditional printing and binding techniques.
Laurel Hill Designs specializes in stickers, decals and customizable creative goods.
These smaller items make particularly good sidewalk-sale territory because merchants can easily move selections into the corridor for people to browse without entering every studio.
Even the Bicycle Shop Is Vintage
Then there’s Dave’s Bicycles.
Its specialty stretches from bicycles dating to approximately the 1890s through 2010, including vintage road, track and mountain bikes, three-speeds, cruisers and youth bicycles.
That’s a pretty good illustration of why the Velvet Mill is difficult to describe as simply a shopping center.
You can go from antique furniture to crystals to handmade stationery and end up looking at a century-old bicycle.
There’s Plenty to Eat While You Wander
The weekend doesn’t have to be an exercise in continuous shopping.
Meryl + Masa is a sourdough bakery and Latin eatery making its food by hand with an emphasis on local and seasonal ingredients.
The Back Door Kitchen & Pizzeria specializes in wood-fired sourdough pizza alongside salads, sandwiches and desserts.
Whitecrest Eatery is the Mill’s bistro-style restaurant, with a seasonal menu ranging from burgers and salads to seafood, pasta and specialty cuts.
Beer’d Brewing Co. – The Mill operates its original brewery and taproom here, while Rum Tropic Distillery produces rum and serves cocktails, flights and bottles.
Borough Bagel Co. handles the breakfast end of things with fresh bagels and breakfast sandwiches.
And Dock 9 adds cocktails and a restaurant menu at the rear of the Mill.
That makes it fairly easy to turn the sidewalk sale into a half-day visit rather than a quick shopping stop.
Saturday Comes With a Farmers Market
Saturday morning adds another reason to arrive early.
The Stonington Village Farmers Market operates inside the Velvet Mill from 9 a.m. to noon, bringing local farmers, food producers and makers into the building.
That means Saturday visitors can effectively shop two events at once.
Start with the farmers market, wander into the Mill’s shops and studios, see what participating businesses have put into the hallways for the sidewalk sale, stop for lunch and keep exploring.
It’s difficult to think of many places where the shopping list could plausibly include vegetables, sourdough bread, an antique lamp, a crystal, an original painting, a vintage bicycle and a locally brewed IPA.
The Velvet Mill can get weird that way.
From Velvet Factory to Indoor Main Street
The building itself makes the sale more interesting.
The Velvet Mill was constructed in 1888 and became home to the American Velvet Company, which produced textiles here for more than a century before manufacturing ceased in Stonington in 1996.
Rather than demolishing the enormous industrial complex or converting the entire building into residences, it gradually became something resembling an indoor neighborhood.
Artists moved in.
Then galleries.
Makers.
Small retailers.
Restaurants.
Fitness and wellness studios.
A brewery.
A distillery.
And more businesses followed.
The old industrial corridors now function almost like streets connecting them.
For one weekend in September, that analogy becomes literal.
The merchants are putting their merchandise out on the “sidewalk.”
The sidewalk just happens to be inside a 19th-century velvet factory.
Details
Event: The Velvet Mill End-of-Season Indoor Sidewalk Sale
Dates: Saturday, September 19 and Sunday, September 20, 2026
Venue: The Velvet Mill
Address: 22 Bayview Avenue, Stonington, CT 06378
Admission: Free
Format: Participating businesses place sale, clearance and promotional merchandise in the hallways outside their shops
Merchants: The Velvet Mill has not published a definitive list of participating sidewalk-sale businesses; not every tenant should be assumed to be offering sale merchandise
Shopping: Vintage and antiques, clothing, jewelry, furniture, home décor, art, collectibles, books, bicycles, rocks and minerals, handmade goods and more
Food & Drink: Multiple restaurants, bakeries and beverage businesses operate inside the Mill
Saturday Farmers Market: 9 a.m.–noon
Tip: Organizers recommend arriving early for the best selection
Setting: Indoors; the sale takes place throughout the Mill’s interior hallways
More information is available at the Event Website link below.
Featured image is an artistic representation inspired by the event and may not depict the actual people, location, or activities shown.