Some Pretties

This is more for me than you, whoever might be reading this. I wanted to document my time at the AQS Quilt Show in Grand Rapids, since this blog serves as my online journal. But hopefully you'll enjoy the quilts too.

It's been over 20 years since I attended an AQS quilt show, back when they were only held in Paducah. I was thrilled to learn they were having a show practically in my back yard, while we are in the U.S. this summer. Even more fun, I was able to go with two friends!

We'd signed up to attend the show on Thursday and Friday, so when we arrived in Grand Rapids on Wednesday, we took the opportunity to visit a couple museums who had special quilt exhibits in conjunction with the show. At the Grand Rapids Public Museum we were able to view a dozen quilts from their collection.

This Virginia Star Variation was made sometime in the late 1800s but they don't know who made it.

Charity Goold worked on this President's Wreath from 1860 through 1880.

Isn't it amazing how the colors are still so vibrant over 150 years later?! And the detail is phenomenal. Charity carefully stuffed the red roses and buds to create dimension.

Thursday I took an all day class, and I shared one of the few photos from that day on my Project 365 blog, so I won't repeat it here.

I spent Friday looking at the hundreds of quilts in the show. Seriously, it was sensory and inspiration overload! I took lots of photos, and most of them weren't so great. I really need to learn how to use our new-to-us camera.

Anyway, I'm only sharing a few of them here. I tried to pick a good representation of the wide variety.

"In Orbit" by Evelyn Evers of Canada is one of those mind-bending, optical illusion quilts:

Absolutely stunning but thinking about the math that had to go into making this quilt just makes my head hurt.

When I saw the name of this quilt ("Sushi III"), I had to take a photo for Tina.

I sent the photo to her via e-mail while she was hanging out with a group of female friends who all love sushi, and they thought the quilt was fabulous. It's definitely fun and colorful! Made by Mary Kay Price from Oregon, who used reverse appliqué, batiks and hand-dyed cottons.

This one made me smile.

Jan Berg-Rezmer of Michigan used raw-edge appliqué, fabric paint and photo transfer to create "Ask The Cowboys". This gorgeous art quilt made me want to try my hand at another portrait quilt.

There was a section of the show devoted to individual competitions by various quilt guilds. These small quilts packed a punch!

Across the Squares Quilters from Charlotte, Michigan, had an "Under" theme and I really liked the playfulness of this one by Carol Randell that she named "Under Cover".

The quilt "fort" was just adorable and you could actually lift it to see the little girl playing underneath.

Bridge Project 2013, hosted by the Eureka, California, based Fiber Art Friends, had so many lovely little quilts -- I think I took a photo of each and every one of them. But for the sake of brevity I'm only including one here.

Diane May created "Bridge of Dreams" and I really liked her use of color.

And finally I just had to share a photo of this stunning piece by Mark Sherman, that took over 3,000 hours to complete!

Included in the Master Pieces section, "Wings and Feathers" has won multiple awards -- for obvious reasons -- and absolutely blew me away. Here's a fun article about Mark, if you'd like to know more about the man behind the butterflies.

I included two photos of a quilt by another man, this one from Cairo, Egypt, on the Project 365 blog. Two of the Tentmakers of Cairo were at the show, displaying several dozen quilts and demonstrating their technique.

And although I thought I'd taken photos of a few of the Caohagan quilts, apparently I did not. But I am linking to their website, because the quilts are just so much fun. Caohagan is an island in the Philippines that's actually owned by a Japanese man. Confused? Yeah, me too. However, I applaud his introduction of quiltmaking which has provided a sustainable income for the burgeoning community of quilters. All the quilts are designed free-hand and the islanders use of color and pattern make for some super happy quilts!

So there you have it, a quick overview of the AQS Show in Grand Rapids. So what do you think? Which was your favorite quilt?