Quilt Festival 2015

The International Quilt Festival was in town last week, so I made my now-traditional trip downtown to the convention center to check it out! The past two years, I’ve taken a day off work and gone on my own. I didn’t have to take a day off this year (thanks, maternity leave) but I did have Charlotte with me!

I figured if things went south we’d just head home early, but fortunately Charlotte was a little angel. She was content to hang out in her stroller and took a couple naps. Also? Babies are VERY popular at events where the average attendee is a grandmother! She definitely got a lot of “awwwws” as we wandered through the festival.

On top of Charlotte, my friend Liz also met us there! We hung out for the first few hours, and then Charlotte and I stayed a couple more hours after she had to leave. I’d never had a friend go with me and it was really nice. I really need to figure out how to make time to join a guild or start a local craft night (just like I already have book club). I definitely need more quilting friends.

But enough about all that — on to the quilts! Here were some of my favorites this year:

Mr. T – White Gloves at the Quilt Show by Judy Kriehn;
Color Play by Victoria Findlay Wolfe

The Mr. T quilt was one of the first ones I saw and it definitely made me chuckle. The design was inspired by a discussion about the “quilt police” — the idea that people will judge whether you are doing it “right” or not when quilting. (At a quilt show like this, you are not allowed to touch the quilts. This is kind of a bummer, because I always want to see the backs too!)

The other quilt was part of a small section of double wedding ring quilts. This one in particular is a more modern take focusing on the melon shapes. Cool, right?

Bailando en la Noche by Shelley Stokes; Earth. Water. Fire. by Gisha Wogier

I loved the three-panel quilt on the left, inspired by both “the swirling skirts of Mexican folk dancers and an exuberant night sky.” I’ve had an idea in the back of my head for a couple years to make some sort of art quilt to hang above the bed in our master bedroom at home and this is great inspiration!

I liked the one on the right for the mashup of traditional — the blue is all small log cabin blocks — with more modern — the flame applique.

Baby Jane by Marian Woods;
Hip Hip Hooray by Bernadette Houghton, quilted by Teresa Coolidge

These two quilts both made my jaw drop for the sheer amount of time and effort that must have gone into making something so large out of so many small pieces. The one on the left is a reproduction of a quilt the maker saw in a museum. The one on the right is made out of literally thousands of tiny 1-inch half square triangles. The maker had broken her hip and worked on this while she was recovering.

Dot by Kathy York

I just really liked the bright colors on this one. It caught my eye from across the exhibition hall. And OMG — I didn’t notice until just now as I was writing this entry that the word “dot” is spelled out in the middle. Ha!

Half Crazy, All Lucky by Margaret Williams

I’ve been on what I’ll call a traditional-pattern-with-a-twist kick lately. I’m working on a mini version of a kaleidoscope quilt right now, and I was sorely tempted to buy a pack of pre-cuts for a storm at sea mini quilt. (I resisted. For now.) And since I’ve already designed a half square triangle pattern for either my December or January pattern of the month, this quilt on display got got my attention. The block and colors are traditional, but the layout is quirky.

 
Holyoke, 1938 by Timna Tarr; A Cosmic Event by Sharon Hansen

I’m a sucker for map quilts and space/astronomy-inspired quilts. The one on the left is Holyoke, Massachusetts, complete with a small blue star where the quilter’s house is. The one on the right was inspired by a Hubble telescope photos — it’s supposed to echo the birth of a star surrounded by clouds of gases.

Huckleberry by Rebecca Bryan; 5/325 by Hillary Goodwin

These two were both in the Modern Quilt Guild section. I’ve seen the one on the left online many times (and have Rebecca Bryan‘s book) so it was fun to see in person. It was smaller than I expected! I love the rainbow effect, but what really makes this one stand out to me is the quilting. It turns an otherwise underwhelming white center into something really cool.

I liked the one on the left just for the broken numbers, but the background was interesting too. 5/325 stands for a common formulation of hydrocodone/acetaminophen, and the cut up and reassembled numbers are supposed to represent “the mixed blessing of narcotics.”

Ravendale Star by Linda Fleschner

This one was very detailed, which is not particularly unusual for Quilt Festival. But the black and white color scheme was cool and different, and I liked it.

The Remarkables by Camilla Watson; The Thing I Was Looking For by Takashi Kusaka

These were both inspired by nature, which is a common theme. (There was a whole section of quilts honoring the National Parks but sadly photos weren’t allowed in that section.) The one on the left is the Remarkables mountain range in New Zealand and the construction was based on a particular mathematician’s tiling formula. Hooray for math in quilts! The one on the right is the Pipeline on the north shore of Oahu. It almost looks like stained glass to me.

Wade’s Wave by Maika Christensen

And one more inspired by a wave — Hokusai’s The Great Wave Off Kanagawa. I thought the pixellated look was neat and actually a little different, since so many of the art-inspired quilts try to be photo-realistic. There are more than 7000 pieces in this one. Wow.

Finally, I suppose this recap wouldn’t be complete without mentioning what I bought on the vendor side! It seems to me like fabric prices aren’t really that much cheaper at Quilt Festival, so I tend to focus on tools that will help me with specific skills or that I haven’t seen anywhere else. I bought a quilt ruler upgrade kit from Guidelines 4 Quilting. It’s basically a strip of rubber that attaches to the ruler I already have to 1) help keep it from slipping and 2) help me line up the fabric to be even more accurate. I also picked up an ideal seam guide and seam gauge. I bought the smallest one last year and really felt like the longer one would work even better for me. And finally, I bought a small starfish stuffie kit from McKay Manor Musers. It was only $5 and just too cute to pass up as something to make for Charlotte.

And that’s a wrap! Until next year, Quilt Festival…