My most recent work has been focussed on channeling the colors that speak to my soul. As the palette for this quilt evolved I realized that the colors that speak to me are the colors of my bioregion. The adobe brown and red clay colors of our soil, desert sagebrush, juniper and piñon, the high-desert in bloom, the clear blue southwest sky, the radiant sun which we are lucky to see nearly every day, and the blackbirds and birds of prey overhead. This quilt has a distinct southwest charm that I didn’t at all plan or expect. I didn’t even notice this until I received the photos back from my photographer and saw it on a reduced scale. This quilt is a story of place.

The star block I chose for this piece is a traditional block called Sawtooth Star. This quilt is an example of blended traditional and contemporary patchwork styles that feels like modern folk art. All of the colors were naturally dyed by me here on the farm some of which I had the honor of planting, tending to, and harvesting. The colors came from many plants including weld, madder root, chestnut, osage orange, logwood, myrobalan, and indigo.

I hand painted the large scale dots on the back of the quilt with natural dye. All of the colors in this quilt and all Farm & Folk quilts are naturally dyed with the most traditionally colorfast dyes and techniques.

The patchwork fabric is primarily an organic cotton/hemp blend, and throughout the piece there is also linen, and organic cotton fibers. The batting is organic cotton. The patchwork is machine pieced and the quilting was done entirely by hand with Japanese sashiko thread in very dense freehand organic lines which give the piece a beautiful texture.

Measures: 74 x 93”