Fabric Bowl

This fabric bowl was made as a host/ess gift for some dear friends. I learned the technique from a friend who learned it from Hilde Morin. Darts are cut into the perimeter of a sturdy canvas circle fused over with base fabric as ground. Zigzag stiches close the darts and pull the sides of the bowl into life. Additional fused fabric pieces add design elements. Machine quilting secures everything and provides an additional element of design.

You are Here

This whole-cloth art quilt is made of hand-dyed cotton fabric, embroidered by hand with perle cotton thread. It reflects my sometimes dark, always shifting journey through the early months of the COVID pandemic in 2020-21.

31″h x 21″w
NFS

Frank

Frank is my nephew and niece’s blue whippet. I did his portrait as their wedding gift. Based on a photograph taken by my niece, it is constucted of fused raw-edge applique in monochromatic kona cottons. Approximately 48″ x 48″

Frank, 2019
Frank, detail
Frank and namesake

Process

Inspiration photo. Credit: Kellie Zinn
Posterized to 5 shades of grey, using photo editing software.
Traced edges on freezer paper

Auburn CA – a Map Quilt

Auburn CA, 2018

I made this quilt for a dear friend who recently relocated to a small town in the Sierra foothills northwest of Sacramento. It’s approximately 12″ x 12″.

I started with a base of varied rectangular pieced of hand-dyed cotton. I fused sheer silk organza over three areas that would eventually represent the urban areas.

Ribbons become highways and river. Foothills are drawn in with Inktense pencils.

Roads, buildings and other features are next.

Place names are hand-embrodered onto sheer organza to be fused in place.

A final touch is the hand-embroidered compass rose is sewn onto the lower right.

Spiral Goddess

Spiral Goddess, 2018

This art cloth was created in reponse to a call for entry. I was honored to have it selected for inclusion in the special exhibit, Power of Women, curated by Jamie Fingal and Jane Dunnewold for the 2018 International Quilt Festival in Houston.

This piece celebrates the divine feminine by drawing from the ancient pagan symbol of the spiral goddess. The spiral represents the creative power within and the cycles of life and nature. The vibrant color palette and luminous silk material provide warmth and life energy to the composition.

Whole cloth 5mm silk habotai, resist painted in the serti method using Jacquard Green Label silk dyes. 24″ x 96″

Detail, Sprial Goddess
There she is hanging in the Power of Women exhibit! Photo credit: Jamie Fingal.

Work in Progress, Lakeside Stitching

Hand stitching projects are perfect to bring along on vacation. Here I am working on embroidering this composition of hand-dyed silk hexagons (hand pieced using the english paper piecing technique). Carrie’s Threads hand-dyed silk floss lend gorgeous color to my hand quilting.

A Portrait of Despair

Despair, 2018

This is the second self-portrait in s series. Like “Hope”, it is a study in values and was constructed in the same way, each block individually pieced before being sewn together as in traditional quilt construction.

Hand-dyed cottons, 18″ x 24″

Wild Weather

“Wild Weather”, 2018

In reaction to the Bomb Cyclone of January 2018 that paralyzed much of the US east coast for days.

Whole cloth cotton, snow dyed with procion fiver reactive dyes, machine quilted with additional hand embroidery. 12″ x 12″

Hope, a Portrait

This is a study in value. I pieced each of the 108 squares as infividual blocks before sewing them together, in the manner of traditional quilting. Hand-dyed cotton, machine peiced and quilted.

“Hope”, 2017