Another New Experience

So that was scary. If we have offended anyone please don't hunt us down, we didn't mean it. Today Robin and I judged our first quilt show. Boy was it nerver wracking. I think if we get asked again I will insist they have a lower standard. It is far too hard when the quilts are all good. It was made even harder by being told we could only pick one quilt in each category, though we did persade them to let us pick two in the end.

I've read my judging sheets and I have studied guides on how to judge but it doesn't prepare you for the reality of having to do the job. I felt that it was important I could justify my choices, I know it always says the judges decision is final and implies it is untouchable but I wanted to feel I could defend it. We were asked to start with teh challenge category, this was actually the easiest, there were only 17 entries (pretty impressive for the size of group) and you could see all of them at the same time. It makes it a lot easier to compare and contrast. Narrowing the field to 6 wasn't too bad, then it got hard. I don't like the idea that judges are nit-picking but what do you do when they ar all of approximately the same level? Well you start looking at the small details, tails (front and back), fullness of bindings, corners of binding and the absolute detail of the challenge. It was very hard but we found a winner, and I realised that in some ways I am an ideal quilt judge, I don't remember names. So I have no idea who any of the quilts belong to, I don't even notice when I see the same name several times. I can at least be impartial from that point of view.

Next we tried the wallhanging category, that was far harder. There are entries all arround the hall, and you can't see many at any one time, so lots of walking about to compare and re-compare. Luckily it turned out our top two could both be seen at the same time, but it didn't help. They were so close, yet so different. Even more funny, we each changed our mind at the same time so we were consistantly backing opposite quilts. I can't even remember what finally decided us, just believe me it wasn't a walkover.

Finally the bed quilts, I knew these would be hard, but it was even worse than I had expected. Again it was hard to see many at any one time. By this time we had walked arround the whole show several times so we were in a better position to start making an informed choice on the next lap. Each quilt was a case of is it better than the last or the best we have seen so far. It worked, well it got us to half a dozen quilts again. In all we spent just over 2 hours judging this show of about 100 quilts. From talking to people there, some agreed some didn't, those who didn;t seemed to follow the logic we had used to make our decision, which I found very encouraging. I wish I could be there tomorrow when the viewers choice is announced. I would love to know what others liked most.

If I do any more judging I will take some little slips of paper with me. I would love to have been able to leave comments for a lot of the entries. The standard was very good, and there were a lot of wonderful little details that I think people might think we missed. We did look at the backs and yes we did appreciate the hidden details we found. I've heard it is difficult to say something positive about every quilt, but I can't say I found that to be the case at this show, maybe we just got very lucky. I would have loved to have been able to talk to the makers, the few we did meet were so friendly and understanding whether they won or not, I do like quilters.

We were treated to tea and cakes with Edith, as ever the cakes were great (quilters can and do bake). She was a fun and interesting lady to talk to. We then had time to mingle and look at the traders, I was very good and only bought a wooden iron, which is something I have wanted for a while. The we were escorted up to lunch. Oh my, I don';t think I will ever get used to being the guest of a quilting group, it is a wonderful experience but I do always feel like I am on the wrong side of it. I feel I should be doing the setting up and carrying things. Still it wasn't allowed, we sat down and waited for things to happen around us. What happened was a fantastic lunch, cold poached salmon and salad, wonderful. As you might expect if you've read anything else I've written about quilters, there was mountains of food, far more than we could possibly eat. There was even a desert to follow, cheesecake and pineapple. Very tasty. To round it off we were presented with thank you gifts, I have a basket of plants. I will be taking pictures of them and keeping them as potential inspiration for quilts.

To round off a very quilty day, we went to Patchwork Corner for my birthday shopping spree. As if I hadn't had to make enough difficult decisions today. I had to choose fabrics for my personal collection. It is a lot harder than it might sound. I don't often buy fabrics for personal use now so it is a big deal. I am far more likely to buy fabrics for a whole quilt now rather than buying on spec to add to the stash, it's strange how I have changed. Today's purchases will translate into two quilt tops, one in shades of blue batiks and one in Loni Rossi's new collection. I think I will add some of her past fabrics to it as well, and it will be a black red and gold quilt again. Of course I have no idea when I will get time to actually make either of them. I hope that I may make a pattern from the design I have for the blue one, so that might get done sooner rather than later.

Review of Trentham Gardens Quilt Show

This months British Patchwork and Quilting has a review of the Trentham Garden show, Quilts in the Garden. I was thrilled to see there is a picture of 'Nudes Triptych' and they got my name right. OK it isn't a huge picture but I still get a kick out of seeing my work in a magazine. The review was nicely written too, I enjoy reading about where my quilts have been.

The best news in the article was the winner of the viewers choice, 'Wreck' by Diana Brockway. It was hung above mine at the NEC last year, and I loved it. I felt it should have won the pictorial category then, so this seems a well earned award. I guess I wasn't the only one who felt it deserved recognition. I would love to know why the judges disagree with us. I am also amused that I was competing with it again.

On the subject of judging, I will be at the Amwell Quilter Exhibition tomorrow to judge there. It's quite scary really, I mean what a responsibility. I will do my best, but I am quite sure people will disagree with my decisions. If you aren't busy tomorrow or Sunday do come along and have a look, I believe there will be in the region of 100 quilts on display. The show is at The Drill Hall, Amwell End, Ware. I don't have a postcode for it, sorry.

In Full Bloom Returns

There is one thing I really love about sending quilts to American shows, getting them back. Not in any negative way you understand, but because I know they come with things in the box. I love to have the show guide and the judging forms with the quilt which seems to be standard in the USA. I like the note saying who packed my quilt, I like the thank you letter from the organizer, and I am thrilled with the care taken in packing my quilt.

The judges comments do range from enlightening, encouraging, funny to bizarre and somewhat confusing, but I think that is common world wide. In the case of In Full Bloom I feel each judge has picked up on one thing I think is wrong with the quilt and I need to improve on. One pointed out I need to watch my tension, and the other that my mitres could be better. Both things I am working on and was aware of. I find it rather reassuring when a judge agrees with me on something like that, I feel it shows I do have a clue what I should be doing.

On the other hand one of the judges has me mystified with another tip for improvement, filled and even bindings. The binding is full to the edge, I've just been all the way around checking it. I was sure it was but you never know. The binding also looks pretty even to me. I haven't actually taken a ruler to it to check, but ... So is this just the comment of the moment? I know a lot of people on quiltart have been talking about this recently so maybe it is a phase the judges are going through. Are they looking for us to add extra wadding to the bindings to actually round it out? If so I see me getting a lot more of this comment as I really don't like that look.

I was somewhat amused by the complete difference in the rating of various aspects of my quilt. I don't think the judges agreed on any point. Just goes to show judging is very subjective. Otherwise how could one judge see "Integration of all design elements" as excellent and the other as needs improvement. The same was true of "Execution of chosen construction techniques". Before you ask no it wasn't just one judge being more picky as they swapped over their differences on several points. I am very pleased I only had two "Needs improvement" though and they were both from the same judge. Even more pleasing was the fact that both judges said I had a "Good choice of quilting design and style", which given quilting is my profession is possibly the most important thing they could have picked to like. Oddly the slightly more critical judge was also the one who offered more praise, so overall I am pretty pleased. Sorry but I will be largely ignoring two of the pieces of advice, the tip about binding and the suggestion that smaller squares for the blossom would have had more impact. The latter is possibly true, but not the point of the piece. I specifically chose to work with that resolution of piece.