Maquettes and why I love Jacquie.

How cool do those look? All rolled up in the back of the car!

Oh dear blog readers, I'm so terrible. It's been more than a month since the fabulous Jacquie Gering presented at our Chicago Modern Quilt Guild, and I still haven't shared it with you. 

I saw this quilt in person! This is one of my faves!!

My little story starts last year just before Christmas - we had scheduled a sew-in for our CMQG meeting, but the park district had forgotten our extended time frame and didn't unlock the building for us early. We all ended up down the road at a diner hanging out and drinking coffee - there were a lot of us, and a lot of new faces. It just happened that I sat down next to Jacquie - of Tallgrass Prairie Studio - it was her first CMQG meeting after her recent move to the city. You know her, I know her, we're all immensely inspired by her -- but even after chatting with her for about an hour I didn't recognise her (it makes you think though - what do you bloggers look like?). lol. How embarrassing! 

Back to the present - er - last month. Jacquie presented for us at our April guild meeting and it was spectacular. It really was one of the most inspiring meetings ever. You should have seen it - all those beautiful quilts, and she told us a bit about each one, and about herself, and her journey in quilting. She's really a fantastic person - truly inspiring. 

If you have any idea how amazing this quilt is in real life?
It's about 200x more amazing than it is on the computer screen!

So the point of this post? Other than sharing with you about meeting Jacquie and how awesome her presentation was, and her book - let's not forget about that! (I keep getting side tracked). The point is, she had brought with her many smaller quilts "Maquettes" she called them. A smaller version or a test piece for a larger quilt. Genius! 

Everyone needs a purse to match their fav. quilt right? 

I've had this idea floating around in my head - a quilt I want to make that involves giant strips of paper pieced parts as well as strips of free piecing and textured things etc. It's intense. I've barely even attempted to sketch it out since it's so involved. And I want to use my bits of Bohemian and other precious fabrics... but I haven't been able to decide how big I want to make it, so I haven't started. Just now it has occurred to me, what I really need to do is make a Maquette - it's manageable, not overwhelming, and will help me decide if I should make it into a big quilt or a small quilt. 

Book signing!

A maquette, thanks for the idea Jacquie! And thanks for the inspiration! 

Of course I failed to get a single picture of a maquette ... but Ebony did, so go read her write up about them! 

I still need to get a copy of this for myself! It's a great book though!!!