The Empire State Building - USA part 2

On a previous visit to New York, I was only in the city for about 4 hours and therefore only stood at the bottom of the Empire State Building and promised myself that on my next visit I would go to the top! 

It had been such a bright clear day that I knew that I should go now to see the sunset from the top - there were no queues (which I had previously been warned about) and it was extremely windy up there, but the sunset and the views did not disappoint as the lights came on...

                                   

                                   In the Foyer

Sunset over New York City
The sun appears to have an extra halo!

Looking towards the new World Trade Centre, Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island

The sun setting over New Jersey

Life goes on down below

Towards Madison Square Garden and Macys

Looking uptown

Looking towards the Chrysler Building starting to light up

The sun has almost gone

Lighting up in Lower Manhattan

The tip of the Empire State Building

Looking North west - somewhere below is Times Square!

Looking up 5th Avenue towards Central Park

Then I walked across to Macys, but I was too, too tired to go any further than the entrance...

Inside Macys

Thank you for looking at my blog - not a quilt related entry, but I am very proud of some of my photographs they almost look good enough for postcards! It was certainly one of the high points of my holiday.

There's more to come - have a good stitching day!

USA 2013 - Part 1

I've just got back from, at times, a very eventful trip "across the pond". My itinerary included Washington DC, New York, Indianapolis, Shipshewana and then back to Washington DC. As usual, it all went far too fast, but I had a wonderful time filled with quilts, textiles and visiting friends (not to mention my numerous trips to the fabric stores!). 

Theresa, my friend in Indianapolis had offered me a suitcase she had found in clearing out the basement, before I had left the UK, and I was determined that I would not need it for all my goodies - well, you can guess the rest!

I had a rather difficult flight to Washington DC when I developed a severe on-board migraine - which I have feared for many years. The assistance I received was wonderful and I cannot praise the British Airways cabin crew highly enough, but unfortunately, it meant I spent the first day in bed recovering. The next morning I went up to the hotel restaurant for breakfast. 

An early morning view out to Foggy Bottom

The restaurant has a spectacular view of Georgetown and Foggy Bottom right round to Watergate and the reason for this is because it is on the...17th floor - which I have no problem with until the fire alarm went off just as I sat down to a bowl of melon and pineapple - yep, we had to evacuate from the 17th floor - not a pleasant experience believe me, but was hugely relieved when a message came up the stairwell, whilst I was negotiating the 15th floor that it was a false alarm.

A very wet welcome to New York

The next day, I flew up to New York to visit the Interwoven Globe 1500 - 1800 exhibition which is on at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art until 5th January 2014.

This exhibition charts the development of the textile trade around the world from the Incas in Peru across to Indonesia and all points in-between. There were some wonderful pieces of both textiles and embroidery including Inca designed tapestries for use back in the Spanish Royal Palaces, beautifully embroidered garments from the 18th century, brightly coloured palampores from India and Indonesia, a heavily trapuntoed (corded) cotton quilt from Southern Europe which was very, very similar to the one I saw in Williamsburg three years ago, although that one is silk with cotton cords and there is another similar cotton corded quilt in the Lovely Lane Museum in Baltimore, Maryland - it is often referred to as the Mayflower Quilt (I have photographs somewhere - with somewhere being the operative word!), but in the meantime...

Silk with cotton cords trapuntoed quilt c.1600
Williamsburg, Va

Close-up of lower right corner

The original printed John Hewson coverlet from the Winterthur from which Windham Fabrics based their collection 2 years ago was also hanging and finally, for me the piece de resistance - the original Phebe Warner Coverlet - which is much, much bigger than I had ever realised. The photographs especially on the front cover of Quilts of America by the Orlofskys' do not give it justice - how I wish I could have taken photographs, but the museum have a very good website where you can view the coverlet close up. 

Phebe Warner Coverlet - probably made by Sarah Firman Warner Williams c.1803http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/13606

The Winterthur Museum have another coverlet made by Sarah - she certainly had a very distinctive style and like that coverlet the one above has a lot of silk embroidery on it with many of the pieces applied using buttonhole stitch.

If you are in New York, I would highly recommend the exhibit and the catalogue is well worth the $65.00 - it is cloth bound and has very good photographs of each exhibit with more detail about each piece.

After 3 hours in the exhibition I had absorbed just about as much as I could! It was a beautiful day and so went for a walk in Central Park, there was still a lot of autumn colour on the trees...

Central Park

Wonderful shading

There's more to come...!

Progress!

Summer is over, and what a glorious one - the sunniest, warmest and... driest since 2007. It makes a change from all the wet, wet summers we have had recently, but Autumn has now arrived and with it the storms and gales, the first of which arrives today...

Battle was fought and won with my side and back gardens at the beginning of August. Very embarrassingly they had both run away from me and had become so overgrown that I couldn't cope any longer- a combination of a lack of time and musculoskeletal problems had impacted on my ability to keep on top of things. So, with the help of my neighbour's son, both gardens were completely cleared and taken back to the bare bones - James declared that clearing my garden was "better than a workout in the gym" (!), so it just shows you how bad it had got. I can now easily care for the side garden and with the aid of a weed killer, I'll be able to keep on top of the brambles and stinging nettles in the back garden, but will start plotting a new garden over the winter, something that will be easier to look after and yet give me the enjoyment I get from gardening and picking my own fruit and veg.

My beautiful Rose - Compassion

Granny's Hydrangea - my grandmother gave me on the day I moved into my cottage, a cutting she had taken of a hydrangea that I had always admired at the entrance to her home. It has never failed me and has huge "mopheads"

I decided to give the Festival of Quilts up in Birmingham a miss this year. I have been going for 10 years and it's getting quite expensive when you factor in all the travel and accommodation costs - I would have thought differently if there was a workshop I was interested in, but none of them attracted me, so I decided to save my pennies. The reviews of the show have been very mixed and from some of the photographs I have seen, I am not at all cross that I did not go. A break is as good as a rest they say, so maybe next year...

Sewing wise - the calluses on the tips of my fingers have come in very useful...

Beyond the Cherry Tree
I completed another block very early this morning - my 17th. It's a heavy looking block and will stand out from all the others, so will need to be careful where I place it, if it is not to dominate the eye. I am  having problems with the bottom right leaf. It seems to be larger or maybe it's the fabric combination? Eight more blocks to go... and then the borders.

Block 17

Phebe quilt
I've done some more work on the centre block - not much, in fact looking at it very little(!), but I am in no hurry and as long as I do a little and often I'll get there.

Phebe Centre

Spratley quilt
I've now finished the centre block and I have started work on the corner triangles. I am so pleased with how everything is going. Unlike previous versions, I have not unpicked one piece of fabric, but I need to press ahead as I want to finish the top in time for the Dear Jane meeting in November, so there's lots to do and it will be my sewing focus from now until then.

Phoenix rising block
In mid-August one of my work colleagues and a non-quilter, Karina, contacted me for help - could I advise her on some fabric or a "simple" block which she could stitch as a contribution to a quilt for a very special lady who had just been diagnosed with advanced cancer. She is well-known within our profession and as well as being Karina's PhD supervisor, I had met her on a couple of occasions whilst working in Australia and is a true inspiration to all. We were both keen to do more than just send a 12.5" piece of fabric  "down under" to Australia. So between us and another colleague Jeannette, we planned a very special block...

The block is of a Phoenix rising which is the symbol of our UK professional body and depicts re-birth. Jeannette drew the picture and was able to make the head less menacing than in the pictures we researched on-line, and all three of us chose the fabrics in just 15 minutes before the store closed. The background fabric is a teal green (unwittingly chosen, as I later realised this is our professional colour - spooky or what?) and we selected a couple of Kaffe Fassett fabrics for me to come up with the colour combination. I then selected a few more fabrics from my own stash including an aboriginal designed fabric to link the UK with Australia and I appliquéd the block over four evenings. Karina, who professes not to being a needle woman despite her mother being a textile artist, did the embroidery.

I think the finished block is wonderful and I so enjoyed doing it - working with a totally different fabric/colour palette, although there are a couple of the feathers I would do differently. Karina added her initials to the end of one of the tail feathers as the organisers did not request any signing etc and it's now winging its way across the world to Queensland, Australia. A very special block, for a very special lady.

Well, that's it for now...

Thanks for reading my blog

Reproducing a quilt - the highs and lows!

Thanks to everyone who wrote to me about my Phoebe block. I started having a play with different coloured birds, but that background was just not doing it for me. It looks okay in the photographs, but in real life...no, so I decided to give it up as a bad job and start again. I haven't thrown the block away - it's back on it's hanger in the wardrobe and maybe one day it will materialise as something else. I just have to remember where I put it...!

I have some Staples III fabric which I will use for the new Phoebe centre and borders and there is enough to "thread" it through the Ohio Stars so the whole will look more cohesive. For the time being though Phoebe is sitting in yet another work basket and instead I have been concentrating on another quilt that has also had its highs and lows - a reproduction of a quilt from c.1780.

Just to prove I have restarted
Phebe!

This quilt has also been a trial and tribulation and I am now onto my third version - yep, I have three versions! But this one is going together "like a dream" - I am sooo pleased with it and everything is coming together so well and... rather embarrassingly, I haven't had to buy a single piece of fabric it has all come out of my stash including the background fabric which I had bought for the first version. I just wish I had more time to stitch, but with the summer break starting next week, hopefully I will be able to put a stitch in everyday, although I still have to go to work each day.

Here's a teaser of what the centre looks like... The whole quilt is a frame quilt with a Tree of Life in the centre. 

This is the first time I have used my I-pad to add an entry - another trial and tribulation, but practice makes perfect, so they say!

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog.

I found it!

Well, Carol the weather-girl said that this week would be sunny with the temperatures gradually getting warmer and so, after last year's dismal so-called summer which was very wet, cold and very miserable, not to mention this year's long hard winter and cold spring, last night I decided to explore my wardrobe for a light-weight skirt to wear to work this morning and look what I found hanging on a skirt hanger!!

In the immortal words of Victor Meldrew - "I don't belieeeeve it". It's my long-lost Phebe centre block. 

I began this block about 3 - 4 years ago and didn't progress further than this because I didn't like it. I didn't like the background fabric - too yellow - I didn't like the birds - too pale and washed out - I didn't like the tulip flowers - too dominant - I didn't like the lilac coloured flowers - too flat - and most of all I didn't like the hillock. So I decided to throw the block away in disgust. A very unusual decision for me, but I couldn't stand the sight of it. 

But then 2 years ago,when my friend LuAnn said she was thinking of making the Phebe quilt, I started to think about the block I had started - I looked high and low for it - did I really throw the block out? Surely not. I searched again a year later and still I couldn't find it and came to the decision that I really had followed through with my threat. I even bought some new background fabric 2 years ago to have another go at the centre, but did not get much further than that - and then last night... there it was. Hanging amongst my Baltimore Album blocks in my wardrobe was my Phebe centre block. 

I still don't like it - I cannot quite work out why? So, early this morning I took another photograph in daylight, it's even more yellow or is it the red pot?

LuAnn gave me some of the fabric that is used in Di's original quilt for the hillock and I've pinned it on to see whether it makes any difference.

But no - if anything it looks worse. So I am going to start again - unless any body else has some bright ideas?

Les petit maisons continue...

 Blogger was causing me problems uploading photographs yesterday, so herewith the remainder of my photographs...

Di Ford's Petit Maison

Miss Porter's Quilt - inspired by a quilt made by Miss Porter in the 1770's and in the collection of the American Museum in Great Britain in Bath. I love the dusky hues of this quilt.

Miss Porter's Quilt

Close-up of the border

Ann's Legacy - inspired by Ann Dagg's quilt in the Smithsonian, Washington DC. This is one of my all time favourite quilts and would love one day to see it "in the flesh".

The centre of the original Ann Dagg Quilt

Di Ford's version of the centre of Ann Dagg's Quilt

Border of Ann's Legacy 

Phebe's Quilt - This is Di's version of one of Phebe Firmin Warner's quilts. Phebe and her sister made some very intricate quilts. This is an adaptation of the original  "Phebe" Quilt which can be seen on the front cover of Quilts of America by the Orlofskys which has the most amazing vine border. I have found other quilts by Phebe and her sister Sarah  notably in the Winterthur Museum in Wilmington, Delaware.

Phebe Quilt

Close-up of centre

Close-up of border vine

Close-up of centre panel

Di had so many more quilts from her book to show, but too many to put on display, these were so tantalising...

More quilts!

An Moonen and Petra Prins - petit maison

Two of my favourite quilt shops are in Zutphen and Amsterdam in the Netherlands. The shop in Zutphen is owned by Petra and Den Haan and Wagenmakers in Amsterdam is part owned by Petra with her friend Nel. I always spend well(!) at both shops whether it be in store or at a show. Petra has a canny eye for fabric. I also have fond memories of having dinner with two of Petra's helpers from the Zutphen store - Bep and Gerda in Nantes last year - it was hilarious - Fawlty Towers could have drawn much from what we experienced!

An Moonen is a Dutch quilt historian specialising in the Dutch chitz quilts from the late 18th and into the early 19th centuries (my period!), and together with Petra they have a new book out called Promenade in a Dutch Garden (Promenade dans un jardin Hollandais), where they have drawn inspiration from antique Dutch quilts for a wonderful collection of reproduction quilts - here are some of my favourites.

Circle of Witches - quilted by Bep Wissels

Tree of Life - Di Ford and Petra Prins

Tree of Life centre - designed and made by Di Ford

Vesalius - designed by Meghan Leslie and quilted by Alison Bacon

Sisters - centre - Designed by Petra, made and quilted by Esther Paap

Doll Quilt by Kris Pieters

Simon - Designed by Petra and made and quilted by Josephine Gaaf

There was one more petit maison that I visited, but I am very sorry to say I do not know who the designer was - but she had an unusual twist on quilts - adding embroidery gave a completely different dimension to the quilt. I will find out the designer's name and then change this entry at a later date, but I am on a roll!

Another version of the Sarah Johnson quilt

Centre of the quilt with embroidery added

Sampler quilt with embroidery

Well, I think that's about it for Nantes 2013. It was good trip all told with many happy memories including visiting the show with my American friend Theresa and her daughter Julie, an unplanned experience of standing up infront of a crowd of quilters talking about my Dear Jane experience, but not so happy memories of very painful feet due to a flare! 

Thanks for the comments from my previous posts and hopefully it will not be too long before I post more photographs... now where are the photos from my trip to the USA last November...