I already have a passion for pieces of fabric that tell a story, that cross generations within the same family. Last year I created a collection of clothes made from monogrammed sheets for my brand Rue des Pyrénées. The sentimental value of such an object, combined with the ancestral craftsmanship, is very touching to me. I'm particularly fond of hand-sewing, both the slow process and the technique. These are the reasons why I turned to the art of tailoring!
Some time ago, a friend recommended the novel ‘The Last Runaway’ by Tracy Chevalier: the story of Honor, a young English Quaker who emigrates to the United States in 1850. She is a gifted seamstress who made patchwork quilts and discovered the appliqué method (which she found a little too easy for her taste) in her new country.
At that time, women in Quaker communities - it was the same with the Amish - often made patchwork together. As in France, where future brides embroidered their initials on sheets, in the United States young women had to make several blankets to make up their dowry (Tracy Chevalier even talks about twelve quilts!).
So the heroine Honor takes with her on her journey a ‘Friendship Quilt’, as she calls it, each part of which is made by her family and friends. Being alone, she often contemplates this quilt, which brings her immediate comfort. This echoed an episode of a series I watched a long time ago, Parks and Recreation (one of the best sitcoms if you ask me). One of the protagonists gets married and makes an appliqué blanket where each square represents something that connects her and her fiancé.
So ‘The Last Runaway’ rekindled my desire to start making a patchwork and appliqué quilt that would illustrate my life with my boyfriend. It's a multi-year project, which I'll do here and there when I have time to devote to it. I'd also like to make a blanket entirely out of patchwork block. So I've bought four books on the subject, which explore both the history and the technique, with lots of examples of designs, each more beautiful than the last.
For a fashion school project due at the end of the school year, we have to do some material research. So I decided to make a patchwork block from my fabric scraps. I use the English Paper Piecing technique (but without paper lol), which allows me to hand-sew everything. I wanted to do a star of Bethlehem, in the warm tones of summer. First, I made the pattern, from which I extracted each pattern piece. Then, I ironed each piece around a cardboard template. The last step is hand-stitch everything together.




I started following people who quilt on Substack, like Jodi Godfrey or Kate Mast. I really enjoy their content, which gives me lots of ideas! I recommend that you subscribe to their account as each of their publications gives me great joy.
Thank you for reading me and tell me everything about your latest sewing project!!
I am eager to see your process and learn more about patchwork. And I love the idea of doing a quilt that tells your story ✨🌷
Je te suggère cet événement en Septembre qui est renommé en Alsace :
Carrefour Européen du Patchwork & Arts Textiles – Des quilts, des villages, des histoires, depuis 1995
https://www.patchwork-europe.eu/