Friday, March 03, 2006

Wooooh! I had no idea the hornets nest I was stirring up when I posted my little rant the other day!

Let me say to start with, I DO NOT HAVE ANYTHING AGAINST THE MAVERICKS! I love the Mavericks ring. I visit all blogs in that ring at least 2 or 3 times a week. Some of them are daily reads. One I visit even before I go around the Stash Quilts ring. Had I been accepted for membership when I applied I would have been happy to be part of their group. At the time I asked to join I did not realize they had closed the ring to new members. That was cool. No problem for me. When they re-opened the ring I could have reapplied. I might have been accepted, I don't know. Cause I'm not really all that maverick. And I'm perfectly happy being a Stash Quilter so I didn't really see the need to belong to both rings.

My "Rant" was purely against the publishers and editors of Quilt Magazine who have chosen to ignore their loyal readers by changing the scope of their magazine to feature collections of fabrics in their designs instead of the wonderful scrappy quilts they used to be filled with. I feel like they've sold out to the fabric manufacturers. That was all I really intended to say. It just didn't come out that way.

My only reason to mention the Mavericks was to point out how lame it was for Quilt to go in the direction they did. That in encouraging readers to use the collections featured in their patterns they're taking away the creativity that comes from seeing a pattern you like and then making it your own by using your own color choices and spin on the pattern to make a quilt uniquely your own. And to make that point I loosely quoted something Bonnie had in her definition of a maverick quilter. Then I rambled a bit as I tend to do in real life conversations when I should have stuck to my original point. I apologize for any hurt feelings that might have occured. Unfortunately it's really easy to be misunderstood when communicating using this medium.

And while I'm clarifying things let me say I have nothing against buying whole collections of fabric. I've done it before and will probably do it again. I can only remember one quilt I've ever made using only fabrics in a collection. That was the Folk Art Christmas IV Yellow Brick Road I made a few years ago. Usually I add some of my fabrics and pull some of the ones from the collection and end up with a group that pleases me. But I realize that there are many quilters, particularly new quilters, who are not yet confident enough to select fabric and colors on their own and need the security of using a collection that has been designed to go together. And, as Darilyn pointed out, for those who do the majority of their fabric shopping online it's easier to buy fabrics that have been designed to go together than to buy what you think will look good and find out they don't work so well when they come in the mail.

So that off my chest I'll end THIS ramble and lets just all go back to our regulary scheduled quilting.

5 comments:

Jeanne said...
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Mary Johnson said...

You're so right - it's easy to unintentionally offend. I didn't take your previous note as anything but commenting on the change in direction of the magazine. I also love very scrappy quilts rather than planned quilts using entire fabric collections.

Anonymous said...

I'm sorry if my comment on your post offended anyone. Certainly wasn't intended to, in any way hope I didn't cause you any trouble!

The Calico Cat said...

I completely understoon your comment & still agree (on a fronts.)

Did you get the cats? (I am still on the fence - now I got my tax refund....)

Cher said...

well stated Nancy-and exactly the way I read your post as well.