A very big chair....

It was amazing how one opportunity would lead to another, almost prepare me for the next chapter in my life.    I was nearing the end of my project of all the prize winners for the South African Quilters' Guild and would attend my  last SAQG Committee meeting during the Festival in Cape Town......

Brush Rags handpainted fabric slowly took off and Yolande Bowman of Pied Piper, our local quilt shop offered to sell the fat quarters at the 2002 National Quilt Festival in Cape Town at their stall.    My workshop Realistic Landscapes was accepted for the festival programme and it was time to make another major quilt ......
As I have explained before, I had this need to revisit themes of previous quilts as my technical skills improved...!     I constantly thought of ways of improving......    Always challenging myself....     I still like to incorporate some ideas/techniques of the workshop which I will teach at a festival in my quilt entries and then treat my students with a viewing of the quilt to explain how I made it..... 

The theme for the festival in Cape Town was Down to Earth and I decided to have another attempt at proteas.   The area is the natural habitat of a large section of the species and I had the idea of combining it with landscapes!   Quite ambitious....    Carefully planning the layout on paper, I started off with the designs.   The focal point would be the large central block of the frontal view of the Table Mountain with 4 smaller blocks at the corners - each depicting different sections of  the mountain range.      I chose Lion's Head, Hout Bay, Cape Point and Kirstenbosch and filled the panels in between the smaller landscaped blocks with proteas and fynbos.   

Cutting and preparing this quilt for stitching took a long time as every piece of mountain, flower and leaf had to be handpainted to create shading and depth.   Detail such as the crevices on the mountain slopes and the lines for all the individual petals on the flowers had to be meticulously transferred to the right side of the motifs, spending many hours at the light box.    I painted the sky sections for the 5 landscape blocks and it was with great trepidation that I started stitching the mountains.....    In a way I felt confident because of the Amphitheatre quilt which I made in 1999, but this quilt was so much more intricate.   I finished the thread painting of the mountain section of the first block with great excitement - I used artistic freedom and chose not to include any buildings in the blocks.......   I made lots of needlelace in different shades of green which I used for the bushes and trees....

I randomly arranged the proteas in the designated panels and started satin stitching it.    I stitched the flowers and leaves during the day and hand embroidered the insides of the flowers in the evenings while watching television.  I used a variety of embroidery yarns for a realistic effect and tried to finish two flowers each night.....

Making Cape Peninsula - Floral Kingdom took me 4 1/2 months of intense work.    I stitched all the blocks to a solid piece of background fabric as I did previously with Avian Grace, again avoiding joining border sections, it just worked so well.    I chose narrow triangular borders to separate the different sections and to add some colour on the grey background.   I used the colours in the floral panels for the small triangles and satin stitched around it in a dark grey thread.

The quilt was machine quilted with invisible thread with numerous proteas quilted into the border section.   This quilt remains one of my favourites.....



Cape Peninsula - Floral Kingdom 2002
2nd Prize Innovative Small Category at 2002 National Quilt Festival in Cape Town

Part of an exhibition of South African quilts at the 9th European Patchwork Meeting in

Val d'Argent in France in 2003.

The day before the 2002 Festival started, I attended the Committee meeting of the South African Quilters' Guild to hand in my project and finish my term of office.   Instead, I walked out of the meeting as the 6th President of the SAQG - a huge honour to be elected to this prestigious position.....!     Back home it was a proud moment for our Guild as I was the second member to serve in this capacity with Jenny Whitehead being the President from 1994 - 1996.



Past SAQG Presidents from left to right: 
Jenny Whitehead, Rosalie Dace, Hazelmay Duncan, Carolyn Kode, me and Paul Schutte
at the 2002 National Quilt Festival in Cape Town

In the process I learnt so much about people and of myself....   It was a wonderful challenge to be so involved in the administration of the governing body of quilting in South Africa....  

Luckily it was not all paperwork and I also had time for interesting projects and more opportunities....