Two of Us

“We are both inspired by the folk art appliqué quilts of the 1800’s. Our roots are in the tradition of quilting. We love the early quilters who had a spontaneity about them that was not as structured as we tend to be now. There was a period of time when it wasn’t a quilt unless it was stitched by hand. Now people use machines and don’t even think twice about it. When we collect antique quilts, we look for ones that have visible machine stitching. When women first got sewing machines in the 1850’s, they were proud to use them and show off that they had them. I like to think that we are advocates for using sewing machines. I started to machine quilt in the 1980’s, and at the time it was really kind of frowned upon. Now I teach machine quilting all over the country and internationally, and it has really reversed. So many people love machine quilting now. In 20 to 25 years, it’s really turned around.

-Sue Nickels