QuiltCon Lectures, Workshops, More

At QuiltCon, I attended six lectures, and took two three-hour workshops.

Westin Peachtree Ballroom, Lecture Hall

I had two favorite lectures. The first was presented by Youngmin Lee @youngminlee_bojagi of California who spoke about the Korean art of Bojagi: The Art of Wrapping Cloths.

My biggest take-away is that Bojagi is a term that encompasses many forms of Korean handwork.

Two days later, I took Youngmin's workshop: Jogakbo with Ssamsol Technique. 

Here is Jogakbo (pronounced Jo-'gak-bo) as made by Youngmin. It's a single layer of silk fabric that has been hand stitched with silk thread to make flat felt seams.  

This is the class sample.

Jogakbo looks the same on the front and back. Youngmin's stitches are visible because she wanted us to see them. 

We stitched our pieces with matching silk thread colors. This was my stitching view as I worked on it. 

Though the silk fabric is okay to work with, I'm not fond of the kit colors (brown is my ick color). My plan is to try stitching Jogakbo using bright quilting cottons. 

If you're interested in knowing more about Jogakbo, here's a YouTube video about it made by Youngmin.

The other workshop I took was Reimagine the Classic Tied Quilt, with Laura Loewen @quiltfortco This is the workshop I prepped for by making an 18" X 18" sandwiched quilt using Debbie Jeske's @aquilterstable Crosscut tutorial. 

I bought Laura's kit with multi-colors of wool yarn used to make ties. The kit also contained a yarn needle, leather fingertips (for helping grab the needle to wrestle it through the layers),  and a roving/felting needle. 

Ultimately, we ended up with these little felted puff balls on the quilt surface. Though tough on the fingers trying to pull the yarn through the layers, the part that used water to roll the yarn, and then use the roving needle to felt each ball, was enjoyable. Not sure I'd ever consider tying a whole quilt this way though!

Back in the lecture hall, I'll have to say that the lecture that gave me the most food for thought was presented Sunday morning by Sam Hunter (Sam is a woman). Her talk was What's a Quilt Really Worth?

QuiltCon makers have the option of putting NFS (not for sale) or a dollar amount on their quilts. The MQG takes 15 percent of the sale price. 

Your decision, whether to sell your quilt or not, happens at the entry stage - when you don't even know if the quilt will be accepted into QuiltCon.

Not wanting to continue to keep and store dozens of quilts, and full of self-doubt about whether a quilt entry will be accepted into QuiltCon, I put a price on each of my entries, so my quilts were for sale at QuiltCon.

Sam began her lecture by putting a price on a typical quilt. One that's a basic design - most quilters could look at it an recreate it - and it was longarm quilted. This was her starting point.

Then she factored-in other aspects like equipment costs. Lastly, she added skill into the equation, asking: How many years have you been quiltmaking? How many workshops have you paid for and attended to develop your skills? 

And this (picture below) was just the START of factors to consider! I learned that "sewlebrities" charge a much higher rate. And while I certainly don't consider myself in their league, I am also understanding that my 40-plus years of quiltmaking is worth a little more than the 10¢ I was asking. 

This is likely the reason two of my three QuiltCon quilts sold. Lesson learned. Valuing my work was my biggest QuiltCon take-away.

And when it comes down to it, the fun-est part of QuiltCon is meeting up with old and new friends!

These are just some of them who met at the Westin's 210 Bar for an All-Florida meet-up. Unfortunately, not all Florida quilters attended, but it was still a fun reunion with quilters from our own chapter, Gainesville MQG, Orlando MQG, South Florida MQG, and Sarasota MQG. My dinner that evening was one glass of pinot grigio that cost me $16.28. Atlanta is not an inexpensive city to visit! 

Another sort of meet-up was Saturday morning Leadership Mix and Mingle for those who hold leadership positions in their MQG chapters. I'd guess that 40-50 leaders were in attendance. FreeSpirit Fabrics was there and it's where I won the 18-count fat quarter bundle of Anna Maria Horner fabrics - for being involved in the MQG for the longest time. I started Central Florida MQG in November 2011.

Running into Instagram friends is fun too! This is Elaine @messygoat who was working in the Cherrywood Fabrics vendor booth. Just the evening before she'd finished hand stitching down the binding on this quilt that I watched her make on Instagram. It's her own beautiful design.

I'll leave the topic of QuiltCon 2023 behind with this last photo. 

These are a dozen of our Central Florida MQG members (of the 20 who attended QuiltCon) who were able to meet-up at our QuiltCon Charity quilt for a photo. They're a great group of quilters who are friendly, kind, sharing, and loads of fun to be around. 

I am blessed. Linda