Best place to buy an Irish sweater

Remember the Saturday Night Live skit with Mike Myers wearing a kilt while screaming at customers "If it's not Scottish, it's crap"? Well, Frank and Sheryl Campbell, the owners of Thistle & Shamrock, which carries Scottish and Irish goods, don't greet customers with quite the same hostility, but they are passionate about their merchandise -- from souvenir-type gifts like plaid mugs, shamrock socks and shortbread cookies to serious items like kilts, claddagh rings, wool sweaters and vests and bagpipes. They can even order your family's very own tartan directly from a Scottish woolen mill. One thing that's sure to make a shopper kick up his heels, though, is an Aran sweater. The patterns, distinctive of certain Irish villages and knitters, were used at one time to help identify where a dead fisherman came from. Traditionally knit on Aran island, they're now manufactured all over. A machine-knit sweater costs $85, and a hand-knit one will run you $225. Not bad for a little taste of the old country.