April Monthly Meeting

Julia McLeod is a quilt maker living and working in northern California's San Francisco Bay Area. She specializes in making quilts from rescued textiles, particularly silks. Neckties, saris, kimono and furnishing fabrics all find their way into her quilts.

Born and raised in England, Julia worked as a menswear textile designer in the woolen and worsted mills of Yorkshire and Scotland, and later for a company on Savile Row, in the heart of London's bespoke tailoring industry.

In the early 1990's Julia moved to New York City and America has been her home ever since.

Julia enjoys lecturing and teaching on the subject of quilting - making with unusual and reclaimed textiles. Her book "Patchwork Luxe" is published by C&T Publishing.

Lecture: "Rescue Me!"

There's nothing I like more than incorporating old and neglected materials into new quilts, bringing them out of years of storage and into the light of day.

It saddens me to find a stack of vintage quilt blocks in a thrift shop or yard sale that were never made into a quilt. I love old table linens - but who uses them any more? Textile treasures from far away countries often languish in a drawer, looking out of place once we've brought them home, and thrift shop clothing can be made of lovely material but for various reasons, is unwearable.

I say: Reach for your scissors and rescue these fabulous fabrics!

This lecture will follow several projects from salvaged materials through to finished quilts and you will learn about the techniques Julia uses to tame unusual textiles.