Quilt Market Report 5: Some Favorite Quilts

I wasn't razzle dazzled by the quilts this time around, although there were plenty of truly superlative pieces. But nothing that seemed brand new jumped out at me and blew my mind....I think all the revolutionary ideas of the mid 1990's in the quilt world are still playing themselves out. Or maybe the judges just had somewhat boring tastes.
But the Houston show does have a "Nature" category, and as an old landscape quiltmaker, I was drawn to them the most. Again, I only managed to get the name and title for one of the quilts...the rest presented here are images with no names or titles. Sorry!

I loved the treatment of the pine needles in this one. My friend Tracey Brookshier, who was with me as I looked over the show, said she recognized this location in Hawaii.

This was heavily quilted, I think to make it really flat and read more photographically.
Anytime a quilter can successfully depict a source of light and shadow, she is ahead of the game. It is so unexpected to see that in cloth, after all. The border was unfortunate, however.
(In my opinion, that is...I get extremely opinionated at quilt shows, but usually keep my critiques to myself.)

What a great snow scene! And that ice cold blue stream works well, too. But why oh why did was the sky left so puffy? That brings it right to the foreground and it should be wayyyy in the background! Wonder Under would have been good for that sky....flat, flat, flat.

Very nice treatment of the water here, isn't it? That is SO hard to do.
The quilted sky somehow works here, I think, because the quilting lines are close and consistent, and follow the contours of the clouds.

I loved the ribbon work in the tree here.

The quiltmaker must have really had fun creating this dreamworld. I especially like the upper section of leaves and glimmering nightsky.
Ha! I just noticed the Ent-like figure in the tree opposite the fairy. They are having a discussion about something.....

If this quilt didn't win a prize I will be shocked. The description said it took the quiltmaker 17,000 hours over a four year period. My mathhead friend Tracey figured that out to be 12 hours a day, 7 days a week....so maybe it wasn't quite that much time...but wow is it spectacular!

Here is a detail of it. Utter perfection.

OK, so were there any crazy quilts? Aside from the one that was part of the Amish exhibit (and which was given center stage as you walked into the show), and Debra Spincic's brilliant winner for "Best Handworkmanship" in the Hoffman Challenge, Little Flower Urchins, I could spot only one in competition, in the Mixed Techniques category. (At least at Quilt Festival they have a place for crazy quilts. None of the American Quilter Society shows do, nor do the Mancuso shows.)

Here is the description of it....

And here is the quilt....

...and a detail.
Now technically, this is almost not a crazy quilt in my book, because the quilting is such an integral part of its design. It is like a sane quilt with crazy quilt inserts, and even those were quilted.
But it is an example of a hybrid between crazy and sane quilts, and that interests me. This one doesn't necessarily combine the genres in the way that is most effective (again, only my opinion; it was all cotton and therefore a bit dull), but it was very well executed and an interesting concept.
We definitely need more large sized crazy quilts entered in the shows!

I am recovered now from my trip to Market...I've slept great here at home, and my many discoveries are starting to sink in....
Any time any of you can wangle a way to go to Market I encourage you to do so. It was fascinating to see the quilt industry from the inside out...and I am left with great memories of truly lovely people, too.

Quilt Market Report 4: Demos, Tips, and Booths

Our first full day at Market we went to 15 short demos of new products we thought would be interesting; the next 3 mornings we went to 90 minute classes on various techniques, some of which were useful, some not. After class, we'd "hit the floor", perusing the booths, talking to owners, authors, designers, watching demos, getting ideas. This post will be a hodge podge of a few of those experiences...so come wander with me!

Mary Jo Hiney...how could I have never heard of her before? She is a spectacular designer, with a spiritual heart of gold. Here she is demonstrating how she transfers just the minimum necessary marks for a silk ribbon motif. She pins the paper with the design directly over the fabric and lifts and marks, lifts and marks with a few short dash lines, not the whole motif. Made sense to me.

This is NOT my class sample, but a fellow student's who did a way better job than me. These are Mary Jo's hand dyed silk ribbons, which she had for sale in her booth, along with the most innovatively constructed and beautiful purse patterns I ever saw.

Here is Mary Jo and renowned ribbon embroidery teacher Helen Gibb, who shared her booth. I wish I had photographed Mary Jo's individual purses so you could see, but I encourage you to check out her patterns on the products page of her site, linked above, where she also has some truly lovely cards, and silk collections too.

Moving right along, I stopped at the Tsukineko booth where a terrific demo was going on.

Susan Holton has stitched the outline of this flower motif in black thread on cotton fabric, rather like creating the outline in a coloring book drawing. To thicken the ink, which is a liquid--and this was the hot tip--she mixes it with a little aloe vera gel. This prevents the ink from running outside the line while painting with it, but doesn't dilute the color. The aloe vera washes out, is non-toxic, readily available at your drugstore...what a fantastic idea!

Next up, Misty Fuse.

Here is a great trick they told me...it would have saved me hours of grief in the past had I known it...and some of you no doubt do....
I love to applique cut out letters onto fabric. The easiest way to do this is to put a layer of Misty Fuse (or presumably, any fusible web) over the letters you wish to cut out (I print them on the computer on plain paper). Trace the letters in pencil onto the Misty Fuse, not backwards, just over the printing so they read just as they were printed. Then fuse your traced fusible web onto the BACK of the fabric you wish to cut out and voila, the pencil marks are there for you to cut out around. Then your fabric letters are ready to fuse into place, and away you can go machine appliqueing them down. No muss, no fuss. The ladies here are beaming at me because I was so happy to learn this trick.

All right, I confess to some espionage here. I photographed this rick rack flower that was for sale in a booth--can't remember which one--because it is such an easy, neat idea. This was large rick rack but you could use any size...the zigs are just sewn together one by one, joined tightly into circle, and the zags make the petals. Plop a bead in the center and what a great 3D flower for your crazy quilt!

While we are on the subject of flowers, this one is from the River Silks booth. You can find a pattern and kit for it here. (Just scroll down the page until you see it.) The folks at River Silks were just fantastic. Their ribbon will not snag or run...they worked long and hard to get that figured out.

This beautiful burned ribbon rose was created by my roommate and fellow staffer at CQMagOnline, Barbara Blankenship. (CQMagOnline has just published a new issue, so do click that link and check it out!)

And here is Barbara's beautiful pansy.

And here is Barbara, very proud of the patterns of these flowers that are now being carried by Hanah Silks. Barbara demo-ed in their booth and her patterns have already been very well received. Congratualtions, Barbara!

I will feature other products on future blog posts as I use them...for my final post on Market tomorrow, I will feature some of the quilts I saw on exhibit, and some final thoughts on my experience. Hope you enjoyed this little window into my Market!

Quilt Market Report 3: Dolls

Let's start with these three:
Rian Ammerman, Debra Spincic and yours truly, blogging pals extraordinaire, finally got to meet up in person for the first time ever on Sunday evening. We squealed like schoolgirls when we first saw each other and immediately fell into a big group hug! Our time together was too short....

But this post is really about the amazing dolls on display as part of the Houston Festival. I wasn't allowed to photograph the Hoffman Doll Challenge but I did pay my respects to Stephanie's beautiful entry.
I will admit something here: while there were some terrific quilts in competition and on exhibit, I didn't see anything new that knocked my socks off the way these dolls did. I am sorry I didn't write down the titles and artists...usually that is a blog no-no...but I wanted to bring you some of my favorites, so here they are.

I went mad for this amazing piece...

She's got a ship on her head! And those fish tails.....wondrous.

Be sure to click on the pictures so you can see the detail.....is this cute or what?

I love her....

Sorry this is out of focus, but she's worth at least trying to see...

Just plain strange. I love how liberated the dollmakers were to plumb the depths of their imaginations...no matter where it took them.

These are not just dolls, they are stories....

This pose is especially innovative, I think...don't you?

What is she stirring up in that pot? Where were the dollmakers' minds while they were creating these incredible sculptures? In a land of fantasy, for sure...

What a vibrant community the dollmakers are! I am just so impressed.....
Tomorrow's post will be about demos.....now I have to unpack!

Quilt Market Report 2: Elly Sienkiewicz and Gerald Roy

These people are two of the greats in the quilting world, in my opinion, so I was eager to hear their presentations on their new fabric lines. Both have deep connections to the historical quilting tradition, which is something that, as a crazy quilter, I respond to deeply.
Elly, as all quilters know, is responsible for the revival of the Baltimore Album quilts...she has taught them, created fabrics for them, and even created an Applique Academy for passing on the fine handwork skills necessary for them to continue to be made. She is a most gracious lady. Her presentation was about her new fabric line, "Remember Me", especially designednfor use in Balimore Album quilts today.
Gerald Roy began collecting antique quilts in the 1960s with his partner, Paul Pilgrim. Since that time he has been a teacher, author, antique textile appraiser, and fabric designer. He is now currently designing fabrics for Windham. While he has long been involved in producing reproduction fabrics, his new line is bold, contemporary, and graphic.
Both of them talked about the design process behind their fabrics....and I knew I was in the presence of greatness!

Elly is holding up one of her quilts, ruefully laughing at how the border design used in it was not a good seller (I love it though). What works and what doesn't?....

She has decided to redraw many of the patterns from her previous books to smaller block sizes...here they are sewn up at 8" square.

The commitment of time and attention to detail is what makes me love these quilts...as a crazy quilter who will easily put 6 to 12 months into a quilt, I can and do relate.

The opening in this block design is meant to be filled with an appliqued sillhouette, portraits of loved ones, traditionally. But I can't help but think about how photo transfers could somehow be integrated into this concept...not in a traditionally reproduced Baltimore Album quilt, but in a quilt based on its sensibilities and traditions.
Which leads to a lovely discussion I had with Elly today in her booth at Robert Kaufman fabrics. "What makes a classic?" was her question. "What makes some some art last across the decades and centuries?" Her answer was that classics must have an element of transcendence, something of goodness, truth, and beauty in them to last.
How I loved hearing that!
But then she gave another quotation: "For art to have meaning for the future, it must include the coin of its own times". Hence, the photo transfer in that silhouette block!

Gerald Roy is an old school designer, formally trained in art. He reminded me so much of some of my professors at Cornell in the 1970's, just so aesthetically aware.
He produced his new line to fulfill his own needs in a way: fabric that he could use in his own work just simply wasn't out there. The people at Windham gave him carte blanche to design this line, called "Graphic Rhythms".

These designs were a product of Mr. Roy listening to music. In response to the rhythms of what he was hearing, he filled notebooks with line drawings. Then he would abstract sections from them, create repeating images from the sections, refine those, etc.
He follows the old school of painting in that he never uses black...he mixes colors using complimentaries in order to keep them very clear, rich, and bright. He used that principle in coloring these designs. He also had this to say...."In working with color, if you have likes and dislikes you work at a disadvantage. Not ever using certain colors is like playing a sonata with part of the keyboard missing." That is good for us to remember, isn't it?

I had to ask him....."What music were you listening to when you made these designs?" Lots of kinds, he said, but above all, the Bach Fugues.
I KNEW he was going to say Bach!!!!

One tip for you all....the Regency Dandy line he created last year, that uses vintage designs in hot, contemporary colors exemplifies the things that Elly and I were talking about about regarding what makes a classic, how to make that contemporary...I asked if there was any of the fabric line left on the planet and he said no...but then two shop owners in the audience piped up, "We bought the whole line and we still have some." Here's the link....Quiltstock.com

Lots more coming....!

Quilt Market Report 1

Dateline: Holiday Inn Express, George Brown Convention Center, Houston, Texas
5 a.m., October 28

It's a good thing sleep works such magic, because after two days "on the floor" at the Houston Quilt Market, going to presentations of new books, products, and fabric lines and talking to vendors selling the same...I was an utterly whipped puppy dog last night when I thought I'd be blogging.
I will say this: my first impression of the people who serve the quilt industry is very positive. Most of these myriad businesses are run by women who have started them up from dreams and passions and who have made them go with incredibly hard work and often the help of their children, who join the businesses with them. The vibe is good between the vendors, there is a spirit of co-operation where they want to help each other out. But all is very professional.

We had a day of short presentations of products and techniques on Friday, called "Schoolhouse"...15 of them. There are 1 1/2 hour classes in the mornings Sat, Sun, and Monday on subjects we are interested--silk ribbon flowers from Hanah Silks for me yesterday, building a portable workstation this morning, more silk ribbon embroidery tomorrow.
Friday night was the "Sample Spree"...a huge room where vendors have goods on the tables for buyers to buy for their personal (or sometimes their shop) use, at wholesale prices. That was a feeding frenzy extraordinaire. I dropped some serious coin on silk ribbon from RiverSilks and sane fabrics from Japan, Australia, and the good ol USA.
Yesterday after class I worked up and down the aisles of the show, meeting people, hearing about products, oohhing and ahhing. More of that today, plus I will take in the quilt exhibits that are already hung for Quilt Festival later in the week. With no crowds, what a perk.

Blogger is not loading pics this a.m. beyond the three or four below, so you will have to wait a bit for those....
This has been an overload experience and I am only halfway done!


Barbara Blankenship, Julie Yonge, and me in the Press Room at the beginning of day one. Fresh as daisies and ready to rumble...

Ursula of Designs to Share With You shows us how to get these fabantastic shaped border/edges. Her pattern on the linked page, "Elegant Table Dressings" will show you how to do this. It is easy.

Rami Kim's new book Folded Fabric Elegance, is just published by the American Quilters Society. This is not so easy. But the effects are amazing.

This coat was a stunner. Rami's new book has lots of ways to get 3D effects from the Korean tradition into your needlework projects; I thought some of her techniques could be applicable to crazy quilting. Her explanations in the book looked very clear and precise; aferall, she was a PhD candidate in genetic research before her life switched gears and she got sprung from the lab.

Here is where Blogger quit loading pics....so sorry...more to come though.

It's been great so far!