Thanks to everyone who signed up for the Bobbin’s Nest Studio newsletter and visited our new online store!

And now, without further ado, the winner of a set of 1/4 yard cuts of this fabulous Sandi Henderson Secret Garden fabric is…

Gracie!

Congratulations! The winner has already been notified by e-mail. Thanks to everyone for participating!

I know in my previous post I acted like I worked worked worked every minute I was at Quilt Market. But I did find a little tiny bit of time to meet some great people in person! Sadly, I didn’t take any photos, so I’ve had to pilfer from some other folks.

I met Jennifer Paganelli and the adorable Carla Crim (the Scientific Seamstress).

Photo from Carla Crim

Seems kind of crazy that the three of us have a mutual friend! Check out Alissa’s photo to see proof that I talked to Carla — that’s the back of my head over on the right next to Carla! And that’s Heather on my left and Amy behind me, Kathy Mack in the center of the photo and the Quilt Dad over her right shoulder!

John the Quilt Dad and I met last year when we both took Heather Ross’s fabric design class at PNCA. It’s nice running into folks again!

I also met long-time blogging friends Alissa, Jacquie, Jessica, Angela, Amy, Amy, Heather, and Melinda.

I’m sure there are others — I know I met other folks from the Fat Quarterly crew, but I’m usually pretty awful with names. And Amanda Murphy, who designs for Robert Kaufman, and on and on and on. I spoke with Sandi Henderson and saw Amy Butler and Joel Dewberry. I even think I might have seen Heather Bailey (if she’s hacked off her hair into a short blonde bob — is that possible?). But looking at everyone else’s pictures I can’t believe all the people I didn’t see, but I definitely was of a single purpose over the weekend, so the designer’s booths just really weren’t on my radar!

The good news is that if I go back to Market again to show my fabric designs, I’ll have a much shorter list of companies that I want to talk with and maybe I’ll have a little more time to check out the kinds of things you all would want to see!

Stay tuned — you may actually see some sewing again on this blog one day!

The other saving grace for me at Quilt Market was the wonderful, fabulous Lizzy House. Her encouragement was what convinced me to attend Quilt Market in the first place. And once there, she provided advice, encouragement, a zen-like booth in which to take a break, and an endless supply of bottled water. I was able to rejuvenate, regroup, revitalize, and hit the show floor for another round of constructive criticism!

Doesn’t her booth look fabulous?? (This is literally the only picture I took the entire time!)

Lizzy is like a little whirlwind — I can’t believe all the things she accomplishes. She is self-publishing a book. And not just an e-book, but a real hardcover book. It will have patterns for four quilts — the three you see hanging in her booth and the one on the lounge — as well as a pattern for the beautiful crewel embroidery pillow in the back left (kind of hard to see in my photo, but it’s a magic lamp.). No crappy filler projects. Just 5 stunning projects with beautiful photography and some really detailed instructions, tables, and illustrations. People, this book is great!

Before the end of Market I managed to snag a couple of Lizzy’s latest goodies for myself. She had these adorable gift packs of her new stationery, journals, and magnets.

The note card pack contains all three color ways of the Castle Peeps designs.

And check out that monkey magnet! My husband really likes the magnet with the lamp.

And here’s something I really love about what Lizzy does. She pays attention to every detail. Even the back of the card with the magnets on it is beautiful! That’s her new colorway of Pearl Bracelet, by the way.

And I couldn’t resist the adorable Mini Bard embroidery quilt pattern. Too adorable to pass up.

Thank you so much Lizzy, for helping to make my weekend such a fabulous experience!

Well, it’s been a whirlwind 6 weeks or so around here, culminating in my trip to International Quilt Market last weekend, where I presented fabric designs to a long list of fabric companies. I know you all are dying to know how it went!

Here’s the brief summary:
1. I am super glad that I went.
2. It was unbelievably educational. I got so much useful feedback my brain hurts.
3. I don’t have a contract for my designs and I’m not likely to get one on the designs I presented this time around.
4. Despite that, I’m encouraged that I have a very good chance at getting a contract in the future if I put more designs together.
5. I met a ton of great people.
6. I didn’t take pictures. Please don’t be mad!

Since I’ve kept you waiting for a long time, I wanted to start off by sharing the fabric lines I presented to the fabric companies. So, without further ado….

The girls’ line, Not So Very Contrary

A mocked-up quilt using all the girl fabrics

The boys’ line, Boys Will Be Boys

A mocked-up quilt using all the boy fabrics

The Long Version of the Weekend
It was a very long weekend in Salt Lake City. I spent my entire time walking the show floor, checking out the different fabric companies and waiting for an opportunity to get to talk to the Marketing Director/Art Director/Head Stylist at the ones I was interested in. I walked A LOT.

Quilt Market is huge and pretty overwhelming. Everyone there is really working hard. Well, okay perhaps not absolutely everyone (I think you know who you are!). But even those without booths were hitting up fabric companies like I was, promoting a book, talking to distributors about carrying their goods, researching how to set up a booth or market a particular item. A lot of working going on.

Which is why I didn’t get any photos. I really had to keep my wits about me not to get completely distracted by everything and lose focus on what I was really there to do. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have managed to talk to as many fabric companies as I did.

I want to say this to any of you out there who are interested in designing fabric:

Put together a fabric line. Do the best you can do. Then go to Market.

You will get so much constructive feedback that you would never get by sending in e-mail submissions. I think this really is the key reason to go to Market for a designer. It’s true that presenting your work in person is likely to go over better than digital files. And the fabric companies are interested in getting a feel for you as a person as well — whether they think they could work with you, whether you come off as flighty or difficult. But from your end you will really learn what they like and don’t like about your work (and it will be different for everyone), and you’ll be better able to see what options you have for the future, and you’ll be better able to tell with which companies you and your designs best fit, if you go and talk to them in person. Hands down.

I want to add here that I *hate* (hate hate hate) having to go up to people I don’t know an introduce myself. I have a horrible time at cocktail parties where I know almost no one. And I really dislike having to sell anything, especially myself. But if I can manage to do this *all weekend long*, you can too. Not everyone was super friendly, but no one was mean or nasty. It really wasn’t bad.

I might want to also qualify this by saying that some people really did not hold back on what they thought, and I encouraged them to be completely honest. But having gotten a PhD in science at Yale where people are sometimes downright nasty about telling you how bad they think your work is or how stupid they think you are (don’t even get me started talking about how hard core grad school was), I have a pretty thick skin. So, I wasn’t bothered at all when people told me that they “hate these colors” or that some artwork wasn’t detailed enough or that the fabric lines were okay but weren’t anything special, I took it for the constructive criticism it was intended to be.

That said, all of the commentary was definitely softened by all the complements I received. I was complemented over and over again on my quilts (I had included photos of some in my portfolio). I was told “you must know that you’re very good.” That my quilts are “amazing”, that they are “fine art”, etc. I was told by at least one person that my quilts were the reason they were talking to me. I got asked several times if I was doing patterns for my quilts (yes, by the way, that is next on my list!)

I was told I clearly understood color, and how to put a fabric line together, and that they saw a lot of things they really loved. I included some other art in my portfolio that were not complete fabric lines, and I had people who really loved some of that art, but they couldn’t commit to it until it was more finished. So, I have a great deal of reason to hope for a career in fabric design.

I was also told a lot about how the industry works and about how different fabric companies work. I learned from one company how little fabric designers make (if they picked up the boy and girl lines — which they had no interest in — I could expect to make $1800). I learned that some companies care mostly about the key print for the line, while others need to see the whole package. Some companies have different people that handle computer-generated art (like Illustrator art), while someone else handles hand-done art, and that they don’t do lines that contain both. Just tons and tons of information.

I would like to continue working on fabric design, either for fall market or for next spring market in Kansas City, MO. But I really need to think about what I want the designs to be. In the end, the designs above aren’t really me. I’m not really a cute kids print kind of person, but I started on those for Project Selvage and then didn’t feel like I had time to do something completely new for Quilt Market. I may continue on with some of the other art that I showed at Market (which is why I’m not showing it to you here), because some of that I really liked. Or I may explore more and attempt to create fabric that is more of the aesthetic of my quilts, which got such a fabulous response. I’m not entirely sure how I would do that, so it will definitely take some trial and error, but it would really stretch my brain.

I plan to do another post (or maybe two) to tell you about all the awesome people that I met, but I will leave you with proof that by the end of the day on Sunday at least a little fun was being had. Moda had a free photo booth where you could get your picture taken. Here’s my awesome friend Sarah and I, looking a bit tired after the long weekend.

Sarah was working at a booth at Quilt Market and gave me not only a place to rest and regroup, but tons of great information and even her leftover pizza for lunch. It wouldn’t have been nearly as great a Market without you, Sarah!

While I would not consider myself an expert by any stretch of the imagination, I’d be happy to entertain questions that you might have about my experiences at Market.

Oh, and, yes, I did get to talk to Kathy Miller (and she was lovely)!