GREENSBORO, N.C. — "She was like, mom you can’t wear a mask," North Carolina artists, Meg Smither, is stitching together a helpful combination: masks that slow the spread of coronavirus but make it possible to read lips.
"My daughter is deaf and even though she has an implant, someone behind a mask is really hard for her," she said. "She reads lips way more than any of us realize so I said, 'Okay, well I’ll make a mask with windows.'"
That window makes it possible for people are deaf or hard of hearing to communicate. She adapted a pattern she found online.
"It works great," she said. "Obviously I have way more interest than I even realized."
So much so, that a Triad business is having a hard time keeping them stocked.
"We sold out of Meg’s within 24 hours after we posted it," Kathryn Hashemi said.
Hashemi and her husband, Saber, own Just Be in downtown Greensboro. They say Smither's masks are helping them meet a need in the city's deaf community. Face masks of all kinds have been a hot item at the shop.
"Some day it’s like a quarter of our sales," she said.
Saber even started sewing his own masks to sell at the shop. He's made more than 1,100.
"It was a little bit hard on us in the beginning but we’ve gotten used to it now and it’s hard to stop now because they’re coming in the store and looking for them," he said.
More people are looking for Smither's masks, too. She's sent out about 350 and is working on more to supply the growing demand, including the one here in the Triad.