Quilt as Desired, curated by Mary Kerr, a Road 2016 teacher. [caption id="attachment_3977" align="aligncenter" width="618"] Picture by Brian Roberts Photography[/caption] Mary teamed with some of the best longarm quilters in bringing this exhibit to life. Mary found the vintage tops for the quilts. She never paid more than $50 for any of them and they were in all kinds of condition.  Mary passed the tops on to the quilters who donated their time, batting and expertise in bringing the quilts back to life. Sometimes they added to the top; sometimes they took away. As Mary remarked, “It was a unique marriage of old and new, blurring the lines of the quilting world.”  Shows, such as Road to California that display the exhibit, pay to get the quilts shipped to their location and for having Mary come to lead tours and explain the quilts. [caption id="attachment_3980" align="aligncenter" width="615"] Photo by Brian Roberts Photography[/caption] The full exhibit has 40 quilts. Twenty four of them were included in the exhibit at Road 2016. In 5 years, when Quilt as Desired is done touring, all of the quilts will be auctioned off for various quilt causes chosen by Mary and the longarmers. [caption id="attachment_3979" align="aligncenter" width="526"] Photo by Brian Roberts[/caption] Miss Sally was a top quilted by Sally Garuet, founder of the American Quilt Story Group. The original fan top is circa 1930. The Art Deco quilting was done by M&M Quilting. This Dresden Plate top entitled Melon Smoothie was quilted by Marty Vint of Baltimore, Maryland. Mary has macular degeneration and estimates she will only be able to quilt for 2 more years before she loses her eyesight. When this quilt is auctioned off, the proceeds have already been designated to benefit macular degeneration research. [caption id="attachment_3981" align="aligncenter" width="529"] Photo by Brian Roberts[/caption] As Mary said, “No woman ever started out to make a quilt top. A quilt top deserves to be quilted.” All it takes to finish a quilt is time, talent, and resources – which this special exhibit offered for these amazing quilt tops. You can go to Mary’s web site to find out where Quilt as Desired is going next on its tour. You can also purchase a DVD of the entire exhibit.]]>

Tags: American Quilt Story Group, Art Deco Quilting, Dresden Plate Quilt, Longarm Quilting, Marty Vint, Mary Kerr, Sally Garuet, Special Quilt Exhibit, Vintage Quilts

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 19th, 2016 at 9:50 pm and is filed under Road 2016, Special Quilt Exhibits. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.