Get to know The Guild better by meeting our talented members. Every year we are so proud to have so many Guild members who are winners at Festival of Quilts. We have reached out to our talented member winners and asked them to share with us their quilting life, why they entered the competition, what their winning quilt means to them and where they get their inspiration. Read on and be inspired. Are you entering a quilt this year?

Meet Guild member Sandra Newton, who won two prizes at Festival of Quilts in 2017, in both The Quilters’ Guild Challenge and the Miniature Quilt Category.

What are you working on now?

I am working towards an exhibition with the group, Threaded Together, which we are planning for 2019-20. This body of work is based on key texts (prose, poems, songs, letters) that I still recall across the years. This image is from my work inspired by Jackson Browne’s The Pretender which was a key soundtrack for me in my student years.

Threaded Together is Stephanie Crawford, Paula Simpson, Dot Deane and Paula Simpson who I met some ten years ago studying City & Guilds at Missenden Abbey.

What does your winning quilt mean to you?

My miniature In the Streets won 2nd prize in the Miniature Quilts Category at FoQ in 2017.

In The Streets was part of a body of work inspired by the sixties and the wave of change that swept the globe. This was the third of a series of that name – the first one was entered at the Beaujolais Art Quilt Bienialle in 2016 and in Threaded Together’s Child of the Sixties exhibition that year.

My Guild competition entry Set Free won 2nd prize in The Quilters’ Guild Challenge at FoQ in 2017.

It was borne from a piece of fabric made from a sketchbook exercise with acrylics which ended up in the border and generated the colour palette behind this faith quilt, which fulfilled a long held wish.

Who are your quilting heroes?

Barbara Weeks was the tutor who taught me across four years of City and Guilds. Always inspiring, challenging and encouraging. She was generous with her time and the resources she shared and she prepared us to work together by the end of the four years together.

Can you recommend a good quilting read?

Pauline Burbidge’s Quilt Studio tells her story and shows clear pictures of how she works from inspiration, in her studio and at the design wall to a finished piece. Some of my favourite pieces from her 90’s portfolio are shown. Then go on and read Portfolio Collection published by Telos for more inspiration of her work after 2000.

What do you love about The Quilters Guild and the Festival of Quilts?

I think the Festival of Quilts is an excellent event. I still recall how I felt driving back from my first one in 2007 with images fizzing and exploding in my mind’s eye.

 

We are asking Members to tell us a bit about their sewing life using five simple questions. At the end of the interview each member suggests another to interview. This way we hope to bring you a wide range of makers from all corners of The Guild over the next weeks and months. If you know an inspiring quilter who we should feature, get in touch digital@quiltersguild.org.uk and we’ll send out a copy of our questionnaire.