Festival of Quilts 2025

Did you go to the Festival of Quilts this year? Having missed it last year I was looking forward to immersing myself in Europe's biggest quilt show. I may not have had a stand this year - will I ever muster the energy to do that again? - but I did have a couple of quilts in the show. More of that later...

But first, a little light shopping! I had lovely company for the show: my British Sewalong chums, Jo, Lou, Sonia and Yasmeen. We all disappeared into the maze of shopping stands, meeting up for coffee to compare our loot. I was magnificently restrained this year, despite the temptation, but was on a mission to buy some new embroidery thread. You do really need to see that in real life to choose the perfect colours and Barnyarns always have a good selection of Aurifil 12 wt, which was what I was looking for after using it to embroider my Make Time blocks.

I also stocked up on some wide width backing at Quilt Sandwich - my favourite source for quilt backings - and Flatter from the Soak stand. While I was there I picked up some of their new thread conditioner (I've heard great things about it and wanted to try it myself).

And I have a lovely new bag to put those new embroidery supplies in: our new British Sewalong team member, Victoria, made Jo, Lou and I these gorgeous project pouches based on our 6” x 12” Make Time blocks. I missed seeing her at the show as we weren’t able to be there on the same days. Next year, Victoria, next year!

Shopping done we hit the competition galleries and there were so many quilts to feast our eyes on this year. Here are a few of the favourites I saw (because I’m sure I didn’t see them all)…

Top of my list was seeing Yasmeen's gorgeous new Blomma II quilt in the Contemporary gallery. Hand quilted in a heatwave! Over in the Traditional Traditional gallery I marvelled at all the tiny, fussy-cut hexies in Diamonds are Forever by Maggie Breakspear.

I loved the improv trees and inventive quilting of the Teddy Bears Picnic quilt by iQuilt Studios in the Group gallery and this Contemporary take on the Princess and the Pea by Janneke Vanderee (from her Fairytale Quilts book). I recognised the subject as soon as I saw it!

In the Modern gallery Lyudmilla Bronshtein's Dialogue of Colour reminded me of an Emma Williams coastal scene and I loved the joyous fabric mix and quirky, off-centre frame setting of Tracy Aplin's Tuesday Afternoon in the Traditional gallery (pattern by Emma di Stefano).

The theme in the Quilters Guild gallery this year was the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. They included a number of quilts made by the Canadian Red Cross to comfort families bombed out of their homes (there was a fascinating history of these quilts on the Haptic & Hue podcast). Bottom is Ina MacRae's complex mosaic quilt, made with old clothes and remnants from her family's drapery shop.

My lovely friend Jo Avery had a gallery at this years show to celebrate her new book, Journey to the Centre of a Quilter, and - just like Jo - it was a ray of sunshine. As well as some of her best known quilts - like Journey to the Centre of a Flower which I spent four days gazing at from my 2021 quilt festival stand - and the delicious little books of quilt blocks which you could flip through, Jo made some new pieces for the gallery, including the amazing The Crows are Calling, a hand-quilted bird against a machine quilted sunset of improv log-cabin blocks. My new favourite.

And what did I have hanging in the show? Well, first up was our marvellous Make Time quilt in the Group gallery. I hadn't seen it 'in person' since we'd got together to make the blocks last May. Those glowing colours looked as good as I remembered: soft but strong. Just like a good friend!

My second quilt was hanging on the Liberty of London stand. It was a recreation of my Honeysuckle quilt, machine-pieced and hand-appliqued - during that heatwave! - in Liberty's new Craft Garden collection and quilted by Pascale at Watson & Thornton. You can download the free pattern on the Liberty website.

But I'm not done with having dreams come true just yet, because I'm just back from a trip to London. I'll share more tomorrow...

with love from the studio,