Sochi Olympics Quilt-Theme Story

Have you noticed the beautiful quilt designs of the banners and all at the Winter Olympics?  The story behind this is very interesting and can be found at this site:

 http://www.graphicart-news.com/the-olympic-patchwork-quilt-sochi-2014/#.UvzxbLTN25M

Sochi games’ press release: ”The Olympic patchwork quilt, developed by Bosco’s creative department and given to the Sochi 2014 Organising Committee, will be the official Look of Russia’s first Winter Games.
Our goal was to represent a diverse range of emotions and feelings, connecting concepts like Motherland, Family, Culture, Time, Olympism, Peace, Nobility, Friends, Memory, Honour, Dreams, Beauty, Freedom, Pride, Warmth, Happiness, Greatness, Reliability, Victory, Creativity, Hospitality, Creation, Future, Russia, Planet Earth.
Every region in the world is proud of its unique origins, and it is no different in Russia. That is why there are so many different local traditions, songs and crafts that highlight the individuality of their creators, each valuable in its own right. Bosco had a wealth of choices to represent Russia’s rich diversity, but in the end we settled on something familiar, warm and welcoming: the patchwork quilt.
In the concept design, every patch was infused with the history and personality of traditional crafts from each of Russia’s 89 regions: in a single tapestry we combined Uftyuzhskaya painting and Vologda lace, Gzhel and Zhostovo painting, Kubachi patterns and the flowers of Pavlo Posad shawls, Mezenskaya painting and Khokhloma, Yakutsk patterns, fabrics of Ivanovo and other distinctive Russian patterns. That is how we arrived at a modern, distinctive and unmistakeably Russian Look of the Games.”

Chenille Technique

What do you do with all the beautiful panels that are now available? This is a question that we often ask ourselves and our customers often ask us also.  We have found that Chenille is a great technique to give texture and depth to fabrics, especially panels.  The whole project can be chenilled or just part of it - like the Teddy Bear and Sheep pillows. It is a simple technique, made even easier with a few cool tools.  Two or more layers of the panel or fabric are sewn in rows every 1/2 on the bias.  Using a slash cutter tool, the top layer or layers are cut between the rows of stitching. When the fabric is washed and dried, it fluffs up making a soft textured look, which can be sewn into the project.

 

 

Arm Knitting

I had never even heard of arm knitting until a customer came into the store the other day with a beautiful scarf, which I admired. She told me her daughter had "arm knitted" it for her.  Curious, I had to go onto YouTube and investigate for myself what "arm knitting" consisted of.  After watching a few videos my thought was "I can do this!" One evening after everyone else in the household had gone to bed (I actually didn't want to have anyone see me in case I ended up in a tangled mess!) I pulled a skein of Red Heart Boutique Shashay yarn from my stash and tried it out.  Within 20 minutes I had a scarf knitted - but I thought I could do better so I raveled it out and tried again.  I am not exaggerating when I say you can knit this scarf in 20 minutes! I have ordered several colors of this yarn for the shop, and when it comes in we will plan a demo/class to show how easy it is to make this scarf.