QuiltCon 2023 | Quilts in The City of Escalators

I had never visited Atlanta before, outside of layovers at the airport, so I had no idea how hilly the area around the convention center is! From now on, I will forever think of the massive number of escalators when I think of Atlanta. Fortunately, there was only one instance when I came to an escalator that was not working; at least I was headed down and not up! Otherwise, all the escalators that I rode each day were in working order and I was able to navigate the convention center without getting lost, most of the time.

I was full time faculty and had some concerns that I wouldn’t have much time outside of the classroom. However, I was able to enjoy the show for a little bit each day because of how my schedule worked out. I did a fly-by in the vendor hall and was pleased to see a greater (and better) selection of vendors this year compared to last. I successfully avoided making any purchases even though I was tempted by several things. I knew my luggage was full and I didn’t have much room to bring anything home. I didn’t leave empty handed though. I collected a bunch of stickers and received some gifts from students and amazing quilters I met on the show floor. I even got a fat quarter bundle as part of my second place prize! And I think I passed out somewhere around 200 stickers.

I enjoy teaching so much and teaching at QuiltCon is a great experience. This year I was in the classroom for 18 hours, six 3-hour workshops. Unfortunately, I missed a photo of one of my Moving Color classes (Saturday evening) because we were having so much fun at the end of the class. Connecting with students in the classroom is a highlight of my QuiltCon experience. I had new students, repeat students from QuiltCon 2022, and some repeat students who had taken direct-to-student online courses from me in 2022.

Of course, the first thing I did (post lunch) after my Thursday morning workshop finished was to find my quilts in the show. I was pleasantly surprised to find my Simple Star quilt hanging at the show entrance! In order to find my other quilts, I decided to do a quick run through of the entire show. This allowed me to take in the mood of the show. I didn’t read any signs but I made a mental note of some of my favorites so I could go back and visit those quilts on another day.

I was able to go back to the show on Friday afternoon. This time, I took my camera with me so that I could take photos of some of my favorite quilts in the show. There were so many beautiful quilts that I knew I would not be able to photograph them all. Unlike last year when I had access to the show before it opened to take catalog photos of every quilt, I was just a regular show attendee this year when I was outside of the classroom. My top three favorites were obvious from the get-go. As soon as I walked past these quilts it was love at first sight.

Of course I had more favorites than just the top three. These quilts all spoke to me because of use of color, use of printed fabrics, or interesting line/shape happening in the composition. I need to get back to incorporating printed fabrics in my show quilts. (And I still have a goal to experiment more with applique techniques and transparent fabrics.)

One last quilt to feature on this post! I was excited to see a student’s quilt in the show. Heather took my virtual Ruler Free Finger Paints workshop. She then applied the technique I taught for ruler free improv piecing to her own work. She also took 2 of my QuiltCon workshops this year and provided me with a fresh rotary blade for my final Joy of Improv Arcs workshop! I love my students and it makes me so happy as a quilt educator to see them succeed!

I was happy to see there was so much color back in the quilts at QuiltCon this year after noticing the trend in 2022 of neutral and monochromatic quilts in the show. Read about my thoughts on QuiltCon 2022 Phoenix HERE. I will dig deeper into the trends I saw in Atlanta in my next post.