Aurifil thread bonanza!

Look what came in the post today, how lucky can a girl be? All the way from Aurifil in Milano, Italy. Grazie, Alex!

Some of the threads are for Contemporary Quilts new challenge CQ@10 because of the group's 10 years anniversary. In the world of anniversaries 10 = tin. We are all to base our quilts on a photo of East Pool tin mine in the middle of the landscape in Cornwall, taken by professional photographer, Tony Howell. Very exciting. It's a juried show, so I can't show any details until I know if I'm in (or not). Cross your fingers for me. 

I'm not sure I'm allowed to show Tony's photo on my blog, so I won't. But you can see it here.

It's very dramatic photo in black and white. Although we can use colour, the quilts has to a clear link to the photo. They are going to be exhibited at the Festival of Quilts, Birmingham, UK in August.

As it happens my next City & Guild assessment is to be a wall hanging based on landscape......... Talk about killing two birds with one stone. 

The rest of the threads are for my entry to the Festival of Quilts, in the Art Quilt section. I already have several ideas on my design wall for this quilt, but again I can't show you just yet. Again this will also be the final assessment in my City & Guild on-line course.

Journal Quilts 2011

Here are my Journal Quilts for 2011, they have been great fun to make, and I can't help giggle when I look at them.

I have chosen 12 different languages for shoe:

English - Danish - Italian - German

Swedish - Spanish - Dutch - Portuguese

Czech - Croatian - Welsh - French

This is the very early days of the quilts. Sitting in the sofa, watching TV, thinking what could I do instead of my failed fashion/costume attempt. Then I suddenly thought of shoes, don't know why, still to do with fashion, perhaps? But as you can see, my drawing style leaves a lot to be disired. So I needed a template - and here it is:

Beautiful, isn't it - and it was even the perfect size on top of a 10" by 10" quilt.

 But I needed a shoe, not a sandal, so I traced it onto tracing paper that I then scanned.  I cut out the shoe and placed on top of some fused fabrics for the background.

 

Printed out 15 copies (room for mistakes) in a size that fitted my skechbook, and got my felttip pens out. Decided on three hilarous colour for each, plus black for the soles, binding and "grafiti".

Each of the 12 background was quilted in a different way.

The words was added using frezzer paper as a stencil and acrylic paint.

 

I used 'google translate' to find the right words. 

Making a false start, nerver mind, I still learned from it.

..............................................................................................................................

And for those of who are new to this blog, here is how it all began:

The brief for this years Journal Quilts with the Contemporary Quilt Group was more complicated than previous years, when size was the only concern.

This year is the size is 10"x 10" (25,5cm x 25,5cm) and...............
the first 4 is to have circles
the next 4 to have text
and the last 4 buttons

I have chosen to have circles (or semi circles) and text in all. Watch this space for the last four, I don't have a good relationships with embellishments.

I started this years JQs trying to do something with fashion history and ended up with something very, very complicated and not very interesting. I started from scratch and then I saw a picture of some shoes…… Yes, I had found my subject.

At quilt shows there are always those quilts I am drawn too, but never could live with - I guess it is the same with these shoes; in a shop I would look, admire and giggle over these shoes, but I never buy them.

The background in pale grays, was meant to be as neutral as possible, to give life to the bright colours of the shoes. A textile friend pointed out that it looks like pavement and I thought it could be wall as well. So the text must be graffiti then………..
Shoe spelled in various languages.

Background linen, silk and cotton. Raw edge fused and free motion machine quilted. The shoe is hand dyed cotton. Raw edge fused. The letters is stenciling using freezer paper and acrylic. Felt tip pen for the soles.
 

Brand New Web-site For My Textile Group

The Guernsey Contemporary Textile Artists are proud to present our brand new (and first) web-site, all tied in with our very first exhibition in May.

http://www.theguernseycontemporarytextileartists.co.uk

Do come and visit us there, and please remember this is only the start.

Forthcoming Exhibition: Coach-House Gallery C.I. May 2012

More details to follow.

Published........ again!

Yes, I'm so very proud to have been chosen to be profiled as Quilter of the Quarter in Kludemagasinet, the Danish Guild magazine. Four pages............
I know, most of you won't be able to read it, but you get the picture, and I just had to share. So proud!

 On the bed: First quilt

Thanks for looking in. :D

When I tried to share this blog on facebook the usual way this came up - quite hilarious..........:

Luckily I found a backway into facebook for this posting. For a while I could not add my blog name to an e-mail,  it would not send. It did not like the word 'silk' - it could be 'bilk', 'dilk', 'kilk' etc. 

Strange!

Festival of Quilts 2011 - Part 1 (Art Quilts)

Once again my favourite quilt show of the year, has come and gone. All too fast. But I felt that most of it was better and bigger than the previous years............

So here is some of my favourite quilts in this years show - in no particular order.

The maker, title and number are under the quilts, with links - if found. If you are included and don't want to, please e-mail me (or e-mail me a better picture). Not all quilts have been photographed straight on, sorry. Also, the catalogue does not include sizes.

They are all hung on a black / blackish background.

If you are not included here, it might be because my picture of your quilt came out badly ;O) or that I missed it :O(

#109. C June Barnes © Ammonodia

http://www.cjunebarnes.co.uk/

****************************************************************

#222. Carole Belfield © Branching Out

********************************************************************

#224. Alicia Merrett © The Night Road

http://www.aliciamerrett.co.uk/

*************************************************************

#200. Sheena Norquay © Breakers

FOQ 2009

*************************************************************

#133. Sue Payne © Line Over Matter

(Sorry no detail - yet)

********************************************************

# 104. Susan Jones © Reflections

**********************************************************************

#112. Jacqueline Heinz © Rosebridge

FOQ 2007

***********************************************************

#236. Susan Hotchkis © Herculaneum

http://www.suehotchkis.com

*******************************************************

#214. Elly van Steenbeek © School Memories

http://www.ellyvansteenbeek.nl

**************************************************

#135. Roberta Le Poidevin © Traeer

*************************************************

Sue, Susan H, Roberta and I all live in Guernsey. 

We are members of The Quilter's Guild of the British, Contemporary Quilt and Guernsey Contemporary Textile Artists (soon to have our web-site up and running and our very first group exhibition here in Guernsey)

By a strange coincidence, Roberta and Sue's quilts were hanging next to each other:

Festival of Quilts (NEC, Birmingham, UK) 2012 will be 16 - 19 August

Make a Container, in Patchwork, Inspired by Architecture!

Make a Container, in Patchwork, Inspired by Architecture!

This was the brief from my online City and Guilds course. Yes, well where to start?!? 

Container, it had to be a box, as I have made a lot (from kits, not designed them myself) during the years, so with that I was in my comfort zone. Patchwork, again within my comfort zone, soft curved free rotary cutting, a technique I love. Architecture, well Shaker Style is a great favorite, I have several books on the subject, furniture and a shaker style dolls house!

So with all those comforts, why was I still so uncomfortable.................?? Ah, that was the combination, I just couldn't get any ideas into my head. What to do? And I was very unsure that I would like the outcome, the very thought was very uninspiring. I want to be excited when I design something, not dreading it.

This story have a very happy ending, though - I just love the finished box, the colours, the shape and the quilting. So there you go - it can happen.

The finished box (should have given more thought to the background)

Some of my inspiration

Here the journey starts, with marks in books, rather a lot - too many in fact, I got carried away and nearly driveled onto the pages. Show me a book of cakes and it won't happen ☺
The next step was to eliminate my picture sources, to narrow down my choices.

The box type I wanted to make

Some boxes made previous from kits with inner box and outer box

This is how I would do my box, as I know this technique well. 11" cube (28x28x28cm)

Notes

Time to get my thoughts together - I started making notes on colours and shapes I like. Slowly, slowly the ideas started coming in. The colours narrowed down from the buildings and landscape, and suddenly the idea of quilting came to me: Clapboard on off-white, shingle on bluish-grey, drystone wall on dark brown, sandstone wall on grey-beige and windowpane on blue. How I love it when everything suddenly falls into place.

Making a start

The fabrics, card and wadding (batting). Placing the two fabrics on top of each other, right sides up. Cutting the first soft curve freehand. The first side pieced. Note the card mock-up model in the background. The great thing with this technique, is that no seam-allowance is needed.

The finished patchwork/quilt top

Top left: The finished pieced/quilted top - Bottom left: detail, quilting from left: Windowpane, clapboard, sandstone wall, drystone wall and roof shingles. Both right: the back.

Bottom half of the box nearly finished

This is the outer and inner box being made up, the inner box slightly smaller than the outer one. I ended o up glueing the two together at the top. The lid is the same colour inside and out and I sewed those together. The lid is also wadded on top.

My box

So here we go, my lovely shaker box!

The Quilters Guild Now Finalists

 Thank you for voting!

Great news! We have voted and even better news - The Quilters’ Guild project ‘Unfolding the Quilts’ reached the final of the National Lottery Awards.  The project is now one of three competing for the title of ‘Best Heritage Project’ and the second round of voting runs from 2 to 26 September.

Being one of the finalists means that the Quilt Museum and Gallery in York, where the project is based, will be featured on the BBC television programme announcing the winners in the autumn.  This coverage will make people across the UK more aware of the Quilt Museum and Gallery – and of quilting in general.

The ‘Unfolding the Quilts’ project has supported the Museum and Gallery’s work with young people and the wider community (over 7,000 people since 2008 taking part in quilt-related activities) and also the recruitment and training of volunteers without whom the Museum and Gallery could not operate.  For more information about the project see http://www.quiltmuseum.org.uk/blog/quilt-museum-news/01337.html.

For more information about the National Lottery Awards see the web site at http://www.lotterygoodcauses.org.uk/awards

(Partly copied from http://www.twistedthread.com)

 

Ps. For members of The Quilters Guild of the British Isles - We now have a yahoo group - it will be announced in the next 'Quilter' magazine. This is the address:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/QGBI/

Go Join! At the time of writing 111 people has already done so.

Shoes Anyone?

Journal Quilts 2011

January

February

March

April

The brief for this years Journal Quilts with the Contemporary Quilt Group was more complicated than previous years, when size was the only concern.


This year is the size is 10"x 10" (25,5cm x 25,5cm) and...............
the first 4 is to have circles
the next 4 to have text 
and the last 4 buttons


I have chosen to have circles (or semi circles) and text in all. Watch this space for the last four, I don't have a good relationships with embellishments.


I started this years JQs trying to do something with fashion history and ended up with something very, very complicated and not very interesting. I started from scratch and then I saw a picture of some shoes…… Yes, I had found my subject. 

At quilt shows there are always those quilts I am drawn too, but never could live with - I guess it is the same with these shoes; in a shop I would look, admire and giggle over these shoes, but I never buy them.

The background in pale grays, was meant to be as neutral as possible, to give life to the bright colours of the shoes. A textile friend pointed out that it looks like pavement and I thought it could be wall as well. So the text must be graffiti then………..
Shoe spelled in various languages.

Background linen, silk and cotton. Raw edge fused and free motion machine quilted. The shoe is hand dyed cotton. Raw edge fused. The letters is stenciling using freezer paper and acrylic. Felt tip pen for the soles.

Your Vote Is Needed

Your vote is needed!

The Quilters' Guild's project Unfolding the Quilts, based at the Quilt Museum and Gallery in York, has reached the semi-finals of the National Lottery Awards, the annual search to find Britain’s favourite Lottery-funded projects, in the 'Best Heritage Project' category.

We are asking people to support us by voting for our project, enabling us to reach the finals, which will be shown on BBC 1 television. This would be tremendous publicity for quilting and for the Quilt Museum and Gallery and would recognise the hard work of the staff and volunteers in making the Quilt Museum and Gallery a great place to visit.

For further information about the project and to vote:

 Vote here!

Thanks and please feel free copy this onto your own blog and make a link on facebook!