Quilt Market: End of the Live Blogs

More shots of cute booths:

The Eazy Peazy lady and her friend La Todera are first-time exhibitors with their pattern companies.

I took lots of pictures of the booths offering patterns and very few of the fabric company booths, because I don't want to advertise my competition (AND they think I am spying when I photograph a fabric booth.)

Except for my old friend Kaye England who has a lovely line of reproduction prints called Bread and Butters. Here she is when I told her she was the only fabric designer besides MOI that I was going to put on the LIVE blog.

Here's another new pattern company that caught my eye. The Olde Green Cupboard is kitting up blocks from the Susan McCord book that Karla Menaugh, Deb Rowden and I did.

The block-of-the-month kit includes wool for applique and cotton ticking (from sturdy dish towels) for background, plus a copy of the book and their original design for the cotton set. They are calling their version of the blocks "Southern Gathering."

Click here for more: http://oldegreencupboard.blogspot.com/

 

Well I could go on like this but there are over 500 exhibitors and we had to go home.
 

We saw a lot of quilts! This one in the park a favorite.

Dorothy Parker who did a lot of her writing in hotel rooms.

My intention was to do a LIVE blog from Quilt Market. Several things stood in my way.

1. My ineptitude...like running out of battery on the camera so I couldn't download pictures I'd already taken.
2. Lack of internet access.
3. It is very hard to blog at night in the hotel room when you are asleep.
4. It is very hard to blog in the car. I have always been optimistic that I could use the computer while riding in a car but the cursor is all over the page when you hit a bump and it's darn hard to crop a photo.

I could have done a better job of LIVE by getting an internet card and most importantly by not running over my camera with the car while I was packing to go.

This is not my camera. Mine actually held up better than this but it won't work.

 I'm not even going to go into that story but you can imagine. So there has been a time lag on the so-called LIVE blog but it was fun to do. I'll continue to post pictures over the next few weeks because I took 210 with my new camera.

It's a twelve hour drive back home. This is the time you wish you'd flown.
 

Birds in the parking lot

Quilt Market Update 6

Minay Sirois, Feeling Chintzy

The quilt exhibits take up about half the space in the giant convention hall in Houston. The Quilt Market, the trade show open to quilt shops and quilt professionals, is over today, Monday November 1st. Quilt Festival, open to all, begins November 4th. Exhibitors scurry to change their booths from wholesalers to retail and lots of new shops come in in the two days between shows, but the quilt exhibits remain the same. They permit pictures of most of the exhibits, so I took a few shots of reproduction quilts.

Minay used a printed panel in the center of her medallion. I am always pleased to find some of my reproduction prints being used. The blue star above is familiar.

Mary Curley, Salute to Tradition

Between the stars Mary used a chintz from the Seneca Falls collection that Terry Thompson and I did years ago.

The quilts above are in an exhibit called In the American Tradition 2010, co-sponsored by Coats and Clark. Another reproduction quilt exhibit is the 2010 Study of 19th Century Star Quilts sponsored by the American Quilt Study Group. You aren't allowed to take pictures in that one so I will provide a sneak peek of the book that AQSG and  Kansas City Star Quilts is publishing in the spring.

Mennonite Lone Star by Bobbi Finley

Years ago Bobbi and Penny Tucker thought up the AQSG Quilt Study project. Every other year members are invited to interpret an antique quilt. The theme in the 2010 Quilt Study was 19th-century stars. Bobbi and Penny have passed the organizing duties to others. Bobbi's used her free time to make this reproduction. You've now seen three of the hundreds and hundreds of quilts on display in Houston this week.

Quilt Market Update 5

Saturday at Market, continued....

Did they change the manhole covers in Houston to welcome us Sewers?

Or am I mispronunciating the word?

Even though our feet hurt after a day at Market, Deb and I walked through the park across the street from the George Brown Convention Center where Market and Festival are held.

We'd recommend a seat by the reflecting pool near a restaurant if you are coming to Quilt Festival this week.

Although on Saturday evening there were aliens, witches...

and Edward Scissorshands terrifying us and the small children.

Our guess is that it was a Halloween costume contest

 and party and not just a usual day in the park.

We then walked on over to Minute Maid Park a block from the Convention Center.

This is where the Astros play, but no fans were there as

 they were all watching the Rangers win a game in the World Series.

 No one was there except about 1,000 quilt shop people.

Moda/United Notions hosts a dinner party every year in some spectacular location.

We ate barbecue and chocolate pecan pie at tables inside where the halls would be during a game.

Some of us took our plates out into the stands and watched the sun set.

And called any baseball fans we knew to say:

"You wouldn't believe where I am eating supper."

It's hard to say what was the best thing about Saturday.

The carpet at Minute Maid Stadium is right up there at the top of the list.

Quilt Market Update 4

9 A.M. this morning, Saturday

The lines are forming.

Quilt Market opens at 9:30.

I have an exhibitor's badge so I get to go in early.

It's like Christmas before the children wake up.

Everything is ready.

Lissa at Moda/United Notions has time to write a note.

Moctar Yara, an African importer for Yara African Fabrics, is ready for his first order of the day.

Lynn and Robert at Kansas Troubles are going over the schedule.

Wait a minute. Santa's not ready at Blackbird Designs.

Barb and Alma are just a blur of activity.

It's worth it. Their booth is always fabulous.

More later.

Quilt Market Update 3

The aluminum rods!

I mentioned that every booth gets 3 aluminum cross bars. Each also gets 4 aluminum uprights,

UNSIGHTLY aluminum uprights. 

One can hang a drape in front of them---see the right hand booth.

Many of us put scrunchies on them---like hair scrunchies---on the left.

These are fabric tubes made out of the latest stuff. Here American Jane has classic American gingham for her scrunchies to coordinate with her prints in primary colors.

Some people make new scrunchies every market. They are useful after market as you will have a 3-months supply of quilt sleeves for hanging.

Jan Patek has a variety of short scrunchies in red and black tied with a nice stripe anchored to the neighbor's pole. This looks cute but the stripe's real purpose is in preventing her whole booth from falling over. We've been known to hang too many quilts from the taller aluminum cross bars.

You make your scrunchies out of what you are selling.

OR

Sweetwater used a net-like scrim to wrap their poles.

It adds a romantic look to their booth.

And they can re-use it at spring market.

Quilt Market Update 2

The first day of market, while all the exhibitors are unpacking their crates, the quilt shop owners go to a series of presentations on new products. These 15 or 30 minute talks are called Schoolhouses. One of my favorites was the Windham Fabrics session called The Quilters of Gees Bend. 

Windham invited Loretta Bennett and Louisiana Bendolph

from Gees Bend to talk about their own and their family quilts

on which several new kits are based.

It was the last presentation in a long day but the audience was energized.

We enjoyed hearing the story of  the quilts' transition from utility bedcovers to museum art.

Here's Megan Scott of C&T Publishing introducing

Gail Garber to talk about her new book.

Like a good deal of Market, there's a stage and a back stage. 

During the Schoolhouse sessions you may have 15 minutes to present and then a 10 minute break between sessions. While one group is presenting information...

there's another group out in the hall ready

to run in on that 10 minute break and put up an instant display.

And when your 15 minutes are up you

 tote your stuff back to your booth and hang it up.

It's all hectic but fun...

and the retailers love to hear what's new in the words of the author, designer or inventor.

Quilt Market Update 1

The heart of the quilt world this week is Houston at Quilt Market.

Here are pictures from the first day, Friday October 29th.

Quilt shop retailers come from all over the world

to see what's new and buy for the fall and winter seasons.

It's a trade show and a quilt show.

Exhibitors rent booths to display their wares.

When the thread company, pattern designer, ruler wholesaler, etc. arrives on Thursday afternoon or Friday they find each assigned booth ready. The booth contains a white plastic covered table, three horizontal poles to divide them from their neighbors and white nylon drapes. At many trade shows this is the standard for display.

But not for a quilt trade show.

Exhibitors transform their booths into quilt wonderlands.

The big companies ship a lot of stuff. They might rent 20 neighboring booths.

The small companies ship a lot of stuff for their one or two booths.

Penny at Electric Quilt

Silver and crystal for Blackbird Designs

Quiltmania Magazine

And everybody spends Friday transforming their booth.

Returning the white nylon curtains...

Doodle Press

Leaving the table in the aisle so the guys with forklifts can come by and pick it up

Joe and Mary Koval

And arranging stacks of stuff from button cards to antique quilts.

AQS Publishing

By the late afternoon MOST booths are ready for the Saturday morning rush of customers.