Setting The Table For Success -- Belltown Shop Rents Uncommon Linens For Oh-So-Fancy Events

Klaudia Keller's workshop is a lesson in making the most out of nothing.

When Keller moved her business, Choice Linens & Events, into a former Belltown art gallery three years ago, the site's most interesting features were cold tile floors, muted brick walls and water pipes.

"Everyone was so amazed by how much I did with this place," she said, sweeping her hand toward a furnace concealed by a makeshift table wrapped in a floral print linen.

"But I told them, it's just fabric, and I have enough of that around here."

That would be an understatement.

More than 1,000 tablecloths made from organza in gold, crimson and taupe hang from the ceiling in the foyer. A walk-in closet is filled with bolts of colorful fabrics.

Keller, 45, is not a seamstress, though she can operate a sewing machine with the best of them. Nor is she in the fashion business, though some would argue what she does requires a sense of style.

"People ask me what I do for a living, and they're always shocked and they wonder can I really make a living renting tablecloths," she said. "In the beginning, I asked myself that question, too."

Keller specializes in renting one-of-a-kind tablecloths, table accessories, napkins and place-card holders. But you'll find no red-and-white-checkered picnic tablecloths or dingy-brown vinyl numbers in Keller's collection.

Instead, you might discover a gold and cream damask or a whisper-thin lavender organza. Keller describes her fabrics as "elle-ah-gaunt." Her customers are likewise.

Business is brisk, especially between June and December, when weddings and holidays abound.

Always considered a laid back, khakis-and-hiking-boots kind of city, Seattle has become more sophisticated as wealth from the booming high-tech industry is pumped into the local economy. Seattle is new money and eager to flaunt it.

"People used to like things so understated, but it's changing," said Hale Redmond, the private-party catering director at the Columbia Tower Club, who has worked with Keller for about five years.

While typical linen-rental companies stock a dozen or so varieties of tablecloths - most in solid colors - and rent them for about $9 to $18 each, Keller has 4,000 in more than 70 different styles. Her prices range from $14 to $35.

Keller said about half of her customers are wedding parties; the other half are corporations, caterers and hotels.

It isn't unusual for customers to rent two, three and sometimes four tablecloths per table.

The Cannes Film Festival in France, a broadcasting event with Martha Stewart in Seattle and a local fund-raiser for President Clinton are among noteworthy events for which Keller has supplied linens. A local catering company that Keller had previously worked with requested her services at the film festival.

"I remember the party for Martha Stewart was very detailed," Keller said of the pains planners took to create the perfect garden-party setting at the Columbia Tower Club.

Keller supplied about 20 Italian tablecloths from Florence with large celadon-leaf prints on an ecru background. She met and was photographed with Stewart, a memento she framed and displays on a shelf in her office.

Rubbing elbows with celebrities wasn't always the order of the day for Keller. In fact, it was difficult to attract notice in the beginning.

Keller entered the business by accident.

"I was working for this catering company and there was this big convention in Seattle, and all of the linens were being shipped in from Washington D.C.," she said. "I thought that was so amazing. I never knew tablecloths could have such an impact."

She began by making tablecloths in her apartment in 1993 - 10 varied patterns of fabrics, unusual because nearly everyone else in town only rented solid-color cloths. But she discovered that building her rental business was more difficult than she had thought.

"It was a hard sell in the beginning," Keller recalled. "The caterers and the hotels would say, `We already have white cloths, why do we need anything more?' I did a lot of knocking on doors and gave a lot of things away."

Redmond remembers those days.

"We have a lot of business coming from out of town, and I had worked with clients from the East Coast," Redmond said. "For them it's not unusual to flip through huge fabric notebooks or to spend $30 to $50 (each) table on linens. But people here had a hard time understanding that. So it was a matter of educating ourselves and our clients on how much the product can lend to an event."

Keller so far has little competition. Few could afford to invest in the quantity and quality of fabrics that she has in her inventory. them.

"Her business is actually pretty unique for a market like Seattle," Redmond said.

Keller said she is finally beginning to see a profit. Last year, she reported $300,000 in revenues, a 39 percent increase from 1997. The growth reflects a national trend.

The Textile Rental Services Association of America, which tracks the linen-supply rental industry, said business has been growing steadily. Estimated sales of around $10 billion for 1998 were up 6 percent from the previous year.

Keller acknowledged what she does may not be high on most people's priority list.

"This is fluff, this is not one of those socially redeeming things," she said, nodding.

"It kind of bothered me in the beginning. I was like, this is what I'm doing? But then it brings happiness to people's lives."