My guild quilt festival earlier this month was part of the annual arts festival in our community. Because of how it was promoted, many attending our show did not walk in the door as quilters, or even fans of quilts. Depending on experience, they might have had no prior knowledge of the variety and beauty of quilt styles. Most people who aren’t quilters aren’t aware of the process of creating a quilt. And few people, even many quilters, consider how much they are worth.
As a guild, our primary goal was to showcase our quilts and raise friends and awareness in the community. With that, we wanted to educate the public about quilting.
I was asked to create a slide show to demonstrate what a quilt is, and how a quilt is different from a blanket. This difference is where the value lies.
This brief video is the show I made, stripped of the quilt show credits and titles. It takes a little less than 3.5 minutes. Enjoy, and feel free to share.
Catbird Quilt Studio 
I love this! (As you can see, I’m a little behind on my email.)
I’ll take the kind comment, no matter the timing. Thanks, Mary!
That was a good and clear explanation. I hope at least some of the audience have had food for thought.
I hope so, Norma. Thanks.
Very cool! I always cringe when someone refers to a handmade quilt as a blanket!!!
Oh, me too!
I love the quilt you feature in your slide show and will look forward to your post about it. I think you may have shown the center already?
Yes, I did show the center before. Thanks much — post coming soon!
Such a good, clear and simple explanation. The logic is inescapable, and I wish it could be seen by all those who think quilters are just ‘idiots who cut up perfectly good fabric and then sew it back together and think that makes it valuable’.
Ah, yes, the value question! It’s always hard to explain what makes a quilt valuable. And in fact, part of it is just as you say, except the “idiot” part! 😉
This was fantastic! I enjoyed it very much.
Thank you!
You are more than welcome
Excellent job of explaining the value in an easily-understood format!
I know you want it to be concise, but maybe you could add a little something about the time and knowledge that goes in to the design process as well. I can see someone saying, “But I got a hand-stitched quilt from Bed Bath and Beyond for $30,” just focusing on that part of the process, and not knowing that that quilt was made by some poor laborer in China that had no say in its design.
I love the quilt you chose as the focus quilt for this presentation, so many design elements are evident and put together so superbly — I would just love to see you dwell on that facet a little more for those non-quilters you are educating. Or maybe do a separate slide show on that topic and have them alternate? I feel like you are casting your design pearls before sleep-walkers (if I can mix a metaphor), and I would love to see them awaken to the design talents before them!
Oh, I know, it does SO much hand-waving. The original complete slide show, with titles and thank-yous, needed to be about 4 minutes. A LOT to say in 4 minutes!
So perhaps I can do another one about design. That’s a great idea, and I’ll think about that!
OH, also, thanks for the nice comments about the quilt. I’ll show that in another post soon.
Melanie, The slide show was lovely! What a great message to educate the non-quilters. I will be sharing!
Andi/TrueBlueQuilts
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Thank you, Andi!
I will share this with faulting friends! Thank you for sharing with all of us!
With quilting friends? 🙂 Thanks for taking a look.