Our Story

Worlds apart was started by a former Peace Corps Volunteer, Howard Rackmil with a passion for traveling and fine quality artifacts and furnishings. He returned to Lexington Kentucky from a stint in Ecuador with a dozen or so sweaters knit by a local artisan co-operative there.  He had intended the sweaters as gifts for friends but, needing money to live on, he realized he’d have to try and sell them. he went to a store in Cincinnati, showed the sweaters and when the store owner asked “for six of these, eight of those, a dozen of those…” Howard asked for a piece of paper to write down the order  “Thats how I got started. in those days you could still safely hitch rides in this country.  So I hitched a ride with a Sallee Horse Van all the way to Hialeah Race track in Miami, bought a television  and hopped on a plane back to Ecuador, expecting to trade the television for more sweaters Thats how Worlds Apart began”

Forty One years latter we are still making the most beautiful sweaters in the world from the Andes Mountains of Ecuador