Getting ready for the Spring Quilt Festivals

I've been busy packing for the Spring Quilt Festivals at Edinburgh (Friday 16th - Sunday 18th February) and Harrogate (Friday 23rd - Sunday 25th February).  I have a great selection of fine and thick sashiko threads in lots of colours, striped and plain sashiko fabrics (narrow width) and some great new additions to the stencilled yukata cotton ranges.  We will also be displaying some of the finished samplers from last year's sashiko course.

My workshops at the Spring Quilt Festivals this year, and later at the National Quilt Championships at Sandown Park in June, are for mini boro bags.  These are smaller versions of the bag I made for the V&A book last year.  The bags Fiona made in the photos above and below are about the same size.


Edinburgh workshop details are here and Harrogate details are here.

I'll start you off on making the bag, which you will be able to finish at home.  The workshop pack fabrics are rather special, as we have packed up a combination of new Japanese striped Enshu cotton (from Hamamatsu) for the lining and handles - super strong and durable - with vintage recycled Japanese cotton fabrics for the boro patches.  Depending on how soon the fine white and fine cream sashiko thread arrives from Japan, the stitching thread may be bright red!

Fiona has made more of these bags than me now, so she's been in charge of putting together the boro fabric packs for the workshop.  There will be a really nice mixture of fabrics in them.  This is another of Fiona's bags.

The boro section of the bag is made flat, then sewn up the sides - 

Also by Fiona.  I think she's made more than me now!

If you can't make it to the show, there is a link to a free tutorial for the larger bag on my website, courtesy of the V&A.  I'm also teaching a day workshop on the larger bag at The Peacock and the Tortoise on 11th May - details are on their website.

Spring Quilt Festivals - Edinburgh and Harrogate

I am going to be at the Spring Quilt Festivals at Edinburgh next weekend and Harrogate the following weekend.

At Edinburgh, I've got a trading stand rather than a demo stand, as I can't be there all day on Saturday and Sunday, as it clashes with my City & Guilds course.  At Harrogate, I have a demo stand and a small sales stand linked together.   I have a lot of lovely new sashiko fabrics, stripes and sashiko threads I brought back from Japan.  There are some gorgeous silk haori kimono jackets for sale that I managed to hunt down on my trip (they were much harder to find this time) and a great selection of other Japanese fabrics.

I am teaching the same workshop at both shows - Marking and Stitching Rice Stitch Sashiko - for one hour at 1.00p.m. at Edinburgh and 2.00p.m. at Harrogate, £4 per person.  You can learn how to mark and stitch the hitomezashi (one stitch sashiko) pattern known as komesashi (rice stitch) with ideas for many variations. Workshop kits include fabric, thread, needle and worksheet, with extra thread and fabric so you can try out one of the variations at home.  On Saturday and Sunday at Edinburgh, my friend and top sashiko student Fiona Fitheridge will take the class for me, as I can't be in two places at once!

A selection of my students' samplers from the Scottish sashiko courses is touring to all the Spring Quilt Festivals this year and I will be taking bookings for the next course at Edinburgh and the new course at Stockton-on-Tees, which both start in the autumn.  My next course starting in Scotland will be at the Peacock and the Tortoise in Perth - please contact them direct if you would like to book for that course.

The Spring Quilt Festival will be coming to Harrogate!

I have just had some exciting news from Grosvenor Shows.  The Spring Quilt Festival will be coming to Harrogate next year, from 24th to 26th February, in the same venue as the Great Northern Quilt Show.  I am planning to be there.

This also means that the Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh will move to the previous weekend, 17th to 19th February.  This is due to the move from the MacRobert Pavilion into the new Lowland Hall - the excellent venue we were in last weekend for the Scottish Quilt Championships.  So I am planning to do both shows, one weekend after the other.

September quilt shows

 
https://www.facebook.com/grosvenor/posts/478615789003991 A heads up re the venues for the Great Northern Quilt Show and the Scottish Quilt Championships. The GNQS will be in the new hall at the showground at Harrogate.  The photo above was when we were in the temporary pavilion last year, which was actually very good.  I'm looking forward to seeing the new hall.  There's some photos in this slideshow on the showground's website.

The SQC will be in the Lowland Hall this year - the old MacRobert Pavilion (with the awful access issues) has been demolished! Here is a link to the Lowland Hall floorplan. It looks like it is all on the one level - brilliant. So if access issues were putting you off coming to the Scottish Quilt Championships or the Spring Quilt Festival in Edinburgh, it will now be in a better venue, but on the same site.  You can still enter your quilt for the SQC - the closing date for entry forms is August 1st.

Last year in the old pavilion, my stand backed onto the stairs at the February show... often a chilly spot...

  

And specially for Glyn's 'fan club', a photo of him on his first ever visit to a quilt show, at the Spring Quilt Festival in February 2010.  This is the only photo I could find that shows a little bit of the rest of the MacRobert Pavilion space.  Little did Glyn know what he might be getting into!

 

Spring Quilt Festival last weekend

Forgot my camera this weekend, so thanks to Fiona for these photos - and all her help on the stand too.  We had a lot of fun!

The Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh next weekend

I'll be at the Spring Quilt Festival in Edinburgh at the weekend or, more accurately, my fabrics will be.  It clashes with the City and Guilds Diploma I'm doing with Gillian Cooper, so on Saturday and Sunday, I won't be at the show.  So instead of having a demo stand, we have got a trading stand and will be taking a great selection of Japanese fabrics for sale - something like the right hand half of the stand in the photo above.  My sashiko-mad friend Fiona will be helping us out every day.  I'll be there on Friday (and teaching a one hour sashiko workshop - a Celtic maze in sashiko) and Glyn and Fiona will be looking after the sales on Saturday and Sunday.  Our stall will be half way down the hall, on the cafe side, immediately facing the quilts - 48B.  We have some wonderful new stripes for you, including a 'rainbow stripe' cotton tsumugi - perfect for a quilt border I think.

Quilt show, workshops etc.

The last fortnight has been rather busy, with several different workshops and the Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh.

This sashiko kinchaku bag was made by one of the students at my workshop with Dundee Embroiderers' Guild the previous weekend.

Last week, I had an evening sashiko workshop in Broughty Ferry and some of the quilters brought their finished 'Japanese Circles and Squares' quilts from the group in Monifieth a couple of years ago.

While I was teaching at Scotstoun on Saturday, Glyn got a bit more done on the summerhouse shingles, dodging the rain.  He has started shaping them to fit around the top of the gothic window, using a cardboard template for the curve.

The last but one row is finished on both side walls, but all the remaining shingles on the front and back are having to be shaped individually, so that is going slowly.

Rain on and off yesterday afternoon meant indoor projects later on.  We put together the Ikea kitchen counter for my workroom - this is the new cutting table.

It seems smaller than I remembered it! Having a slightly higher worktop for rotary cutting is going to be so much better.

Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh

I'm getting ready for the Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh today- finishing off packing things and will be setting up there this afternoon.  I'll be taking both versions of my 'Sakiori' quilt from 'Japanese Quilt Inspirations', which I'm doing as a workshop at Edinburgh Patchwork on 28th March.  The pinky red one was longarm quilted by North Sea Quilters - the fabrics are from a range by Momo for Moda.

'Kamon', the other version, was a scrap quilt and hand quilted.  

This was gold print version was made by Nina MacDonald - she brought it to one of my workshops at Purely Patchwork to show me (along with a few other quilts she'd made from my designs).

I am teaching sashiko workshops every day at the show as well.  I'll be next door to Kaleidoscope apparently, near the workshop room.

Mini Mariners' Compass in sashiko, Spring Quilt Festival last weekend

I had a good show at the Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh last weekend.  The new mini workshop, 'A Mini Mariner's Compass in Sashiko', went well.  Everyone got three pieces of Japanese cotton fabric, the same plain fabric that goes into my bag kits, and a skein of hand dyed thread from Images of Egypt.  Glyn designed this pattern while we were at the Scottish Quilt Championships in September.  It works in a similar way to some motifs I saw on an old jacket in Shonai but of course there is no set way to stitch it, so we had to invent it.  My friend from Edinburgh, Fiona Flitheridge, stitched the samples above, not all in the workshop of course - it looks like she couldn't stop stitching when she got home!

Glyn hasn't started any new patchwork recently, although he's been doing some tiling that looks rather like patchwork -

Spring Quilt Festival, Edinburgh - next weekend

Preparations for the Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh have come around so quickly, and I haven't had time yet to write up Quiltfest or the latest sashiko session at the Studio, Loch Lomond.  I have lots of photos of both events, and hopefully I don't have so many that the computer will take forever to read my camera card, as I want to post those as soon as possible.

This afternoon, I started cutting packs for my 'Shimacho' quilt from 'Japanese Quilt Inspirations'. It should probably be called Shimacho II, because the first Shimacho (literally meaning 'stripe book', a weaver's scrapbook) is a cushion I made about twelve years ago, with a different design and no sashing between the pieces.  The random effect makes a lovely quilt block design, so I went back to my original idea and used a different arrangement of squares and strips for the quilt above.  It is actually made from nine giant blocks, one of which was used to make a big cushion (in use on the sofa at the moment).  I got lots of lovely gold prints from Quilt Gate when I was at Quilt Week Yokohama, so I decided that packs for this design would be a fun thing to do.  The fabrics are very similar to those in the original, although with purple rather than turquoise.  One £6 pack makes one huge block and you just add a sashing fabric (or fabrics) of your choice (the one above is Makower's Rondella print), so nine packs would make the quilt as shown above, plus sashing, or your could mix in some of your own fabrics with mine. Alternatively, just make the cushion version.  It is ideal for pantograph long arm quilting. The pattern was also featured in 'Quilt Essentials: Japanese Style', a bookazine by D&C, altong with a selection of projects from 'Japanese Quilt Inspirations' and my two sashiko books.  It is great value at just £6.99, and I will have some for sale at the show. 'Shimacho' will be displayed on my stand.

'Irori' is another quilt I will have on display, but it will probably be draped on my demo table as there's not a lot of space for big quilts.  This quilt was designed to use a selection of striped cotton tsumugi my friend Hiroko sent me, combined with some fat quarters of Japanese quilt fabric.  I bought a lot of striped tsumugi on my last trip, so I have a great selection of different stripes and colour combinations at the moment.  Half metre pieces will make three blocks for this quilt.  I will also have some of my popular sashiko kits back on sale, as they use the same fabrics.

The workshop this time will be 'Mini Mariners' Compass in sashiko. We started playing around with a Mariners' Compass design as a sashiko motif at the Scottish Quilt Championships in September and it worked very well as a sashiko design.  I have the early workshop slot at 10.45, so book as soon as you arrive.  The £3.50 price includes a sashiko needle to take home.  I used to just loan needles for the workshops, but so many people wanted to keep theirs, I have factored the cost into the workshop fee.

There's still plenty to do, so I'd better get on...

Quiltfest and Spring Quilt Festival

The Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh was fun, as usual, meeting lots of quilting friends and making a few new ones too.  The workshop, 'Sashiko in Circles', was a sell out!  I think I'll develop this one hour workshop into a full day class.  It's a great way to try out some of the Yuza sashiko patterns in an innovative style.  I forgot to take any photos of the stand, we were so busy.

Of course, the Japanese quilts by Reiko Domon and members of Yuza Sashiko Guild are on display at Llangollen Museum until March 5th, as the final Quiltfest exhibition for 2013.  If you don't get a chance to see them there, we are planning to show some of them at World Textile Day in Llanidloes on March 16th, but I don't think we'll have enough room to show them all.  Please note that World Textile Day in Stirling will be on Saturday June 22nd - a typo in the Guild newsletter gives 23rd as the date, but it it definitely on the Saturday.

Edinburgh Spring Quilt Festival

Friday, Saturday and Sunday was the Spring Quilt Festival at Edinburgh. My demo stand was at the side of the stairwell, so for once I needed a jumper to keep warm at a show! I had a great time, meeting many quilters I've taught up here, as well as lots of people new to the quilting world (there seem to be plenty of newcomers at every show in recent years, which is good news) and planning some workshops around Scotland. I'll post info about workshops at shops up here as they are confirmed. The new sashiko workshop, the gazashi (moth stitch) pattern, sold out every day and seemed to go down well. Now I'll have to do a larger piece of sashiko using the pattern in an innovative style.

This sashiko bag is stunning - komezashi (rice stitch) is the pattern filling in the Scottish thistle and the other side has multicoloured thread used to create a sashiko 'tartan'!



News of my move to Scotland has been travelling fast across the region and Glyn helped me out on Saturday and Sunday, getting to know a few more quilters (and quilt shops) in the process.


As ususal, this show features various exhibitions by individual quilters and groups. It isn't a competitive show, but an opportunity to see groups of related works.

Dilys Fronks had some of her floral batik applique quilts on show (which was why we have her garden gate quilts at Quiltfest instead - I hope we'll be able to have the batiks another year!) I didn't get any photos, but you can see some of them in the third gallery on her website - click here.

Rebecca Collins was the second north Wales quilter with work on display. She doesn't have a website, so sorry there's no link this time. Her retrospective delved back into the 1980s and 1990s, and the fabrics used in her earlier quilts are very nostalgic for anyone who started quilting back then. She uses a lot of traditional blocks but gives them her own special twist in various ways, often with subtle fabric shading effects.


Jan Hassard quilts are full of gorgeous colour and fantastic geometrical games creating all kinds of optical illusions. A lot of her signature designs are available as workshops, and you can see them in more detail in her website gallery. 'Undulations' was on show (the gallery photo is much better than mine), but I couldn't find a gallery photo for this one, 'Sunrise', -


Anja Townrow had a collection of her quilts displayed. Her work is always so colourful and beatifully pieced, with as many curves as you like! A lot of them are available as patterns on her website. 'Clockwork' (below), 'Spinning Wheel' and 'Playing in the Pond' were my favourites.


Pat Archibald had organised another project based on a poem, this time Wordsworth's Daffodils. Each quilter had two lines to illustrate. I particularly liked these two, but unfortunately I can't read the maker's info cards in the photo, so I don't know who made them. If anyone can let me know, please do. I can just about make out the name 'Ruth' on the card in the first photo, but I can't read her surname. I didn't have a lot of time to see this quilts at this show, as I was so busy, and didn't do my usual trick of photographing the labels in enough detail to be able to read!


Batiks featured in many of the exhibits and there seemed to be more gorgeous batiks on sale than ever. I picked up a few new ones and am planning to enter the 'Batik Beauties' competition this year. The quilts are just one metre square, so it doesn't take too long to do, and it's usually a fun theme. IMHO, a successful challenge needs to allow for a lot of creativity in design, not take too long to make (competition deadlines always seem so close!) and have plenty of options. A set theme, 75% minimum of batik fabrics and a small size seem like a good recipe for lots of entries.

These are just a handful of the individual and group exhibitions included in the show - the full list appears below. There will be two further opportunities to see the Spring Quilt Festival this year - at Chilford and Exeter.