My day yesterday left me rather cranky and irritable and if that comes through on this post, I won’t publish and will see if I can uncrankify it. Work has a way of sucking all the good feelings I get from a few well deserved days off right out of my system.
Anyway.
I took a day and a half off of work last week and went down to Santa Clara to the Pacific International Quilt Festival to visit the Renewed Jelly Roll Race, which was on display. TFQ and I usually go and she missed a year last year. We got ourselves organized again and were back in the saddle this year – sort of. Our trip was abbreviated a little because of family obligations for me. Despite having less time to view the quilts, I think we both agreed that we saw plenty.
I am concerned that once the 49ers stadium is built, the parking will no longer be free or there will be no available parking on game days. I look at these next few years as, possibly my last chance to go to the show. Yes, I am being melodramatic and borrowing trouble. I’ll get over myself.
The show was not as crowded as usual on Thursday and Friday, but I thought the preview was more crowded. I loved not having such large crowds on Thursday and Friday, because it was much easier to take photos. However I was concerned about what that meant for attendance numbers. Both days, I saw lots of white hair and not many strollers. I didn’t attend on Saturday or Sunday, so I’d like to know if you saw more younger quiltmakers on those days.
In terms of quilts, the show had the same look – lots of landscapes and portraits especially. I noticed lots of pattern quilts being shown, especially quilts made from patterns or classes by Judy Niemeyer. I still took a lot of photos.** I wonder about entering a quilt made from a pattern. What do you think about that? Should the quilt have been altered in some way or is it ok to enter a pattern quilt in a show that is an exact replica of the original?
The Best of Show winners were in the “more is better” philosophy. I apologize for being snarky, but I think design counts for something and since I heard a podcast on what judges look for, I have been disillusioned by Best of Show quilts. Still and all, there was lots at the show from which I was inspired. The stitching is still getting better and better and there was a lot of hand work to satisfy that craving.
The vendors were meh. I had put myself on a strict budget and it wasn’t difficult to keep to it. There were a few things I would have bought, but, in general, the offerings were old and expensive. I saw only a few vendors carrying Jelly Rolls, Layer Cakes and the like and the variety of choices was slim. One vendor told us it was very hard to receive the ‘baked goods’ that you actually order and that Moda does one run of them, sends what it can and does not reprint. I suppose I can understand not reprinting the “baked goods” as they have so many lines coming out each year. I, personally, cannot keep up with all the lines and have kind of given up on getting the newest latest and greatest.
I did see quite a few of the Tonga Treats and Bali Pops, which I thought was interesting and didn’t remember seeing last year. I really liked the colors from the Macaron line of fabrics by Hoffman, but didn’t buy any. I still might. Still, I wanted to see what was new and exciting in the quilt stuff department and just didn’t get that fix satisfied. I bought a little fabric, some dotty buttons, a couple of swivel clips and D ring sets and a Tonga Treats pack for a project I have in mind.
The SD card went bad on my camera while I was at the show. Fortunately, I only had about an aisle and a half left. Unfortunately, it was the aisle with New Quilts of Northern California on it. TFQ took photos of the last quilts, so you will have a complete set of the photos *we* liked. 😉
I bought a new SD card, but the camera can’t seem to read it. I like my camera and think it takes good photos. It will be hard to create interesting blog posts when I can’t take photos. I’ll have to deal with that problem sooner rather than later.
There were quilts in the various special exhibits that I liked. There was an exhibit of quilts inspired by the floors at Bristol Cathedral, including a smaller version of her quilt, Cosmati Stars, by Judy Mathieson. This is an offshoot or further examination of an exhibit we saw a few years ago, also at PIQF, of mosaic floor tile inspired quilts by Christine Porter.
Improvements the Mancusos need to make:
- Replace black drapes behind quilts with white drapes. It will make the space seem lighter and larger as well make it easier to take pictures.
- Include a special exhibit of Modern quilts (perhaps the Modern Quilt Guild should organize it?) to draw in more of the Modern quiltmakers.
- Encourage vendors to bring new stuff.
- Consider moving the show back to the City in order to provide more options for public transportation, which would, in turn, increase attendance.
- Create a category for bags and other small accessories.
**I will be uploading all of the photos to my Flickr account, but it will take me some time. There is a link above, but you will need to return later to see them all.