Com·mu·ni·ty /kǝ-’myü-nǝ-tē/: noun. a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals
We’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to belong to a community, specifically, a quilting community. How do we build one? What can we then do to foster its development? How do we makeyou a part of it?
It seems a little strange that a year ago we actually were together and able to see one another in person at QuiltCon in Austin. To think we were still hugging one another and sharing physical space seems a little surreal! Can you believe we traveled on airplanes and sat close to others in restaurants? We didn’t think twice about bumping into another person while carelessly strolling through the aisles of quilts at the show. We could share maskless smiles and laugh about things that happened in class and share our favorite purchases from the vendor booths.
Few of us could have predicted how radically our lives would change just a few short weeks later.
It’s sobering to recall these experiences. We undoubtedly carry some grief for that which has been lost. Each of us has responded differently to pandemic’s effects. Some of you may have felt an urge to finish old projects or start new ones and have used your cloistered time at home to sew, creating new works of art. For others, isolation has been more difficult. You may have felt a dearth of creativity, as though the energy has been sucked out of you.
Curated Quilts has been making a concerted effort to connect with our fellow makers. We recently held a virtual ‘mixer’ with over 50 participants. Thank you to all who participated! By hosting two different break out room sessions, we felt we were able to connect in a personal way with many of you. We look forward to hosting more virtual mixers in the future and hope they will become a meaningful way to connect with each other.
Another way we are curating a quilting community has been through interviewing some of our past Curated Quilts contributors on Instagram Live. We have loved learning more about these makers and feel each has contributed meaningful information to the overall quilt conversation happening within the modern quilting world right now. We invite you to watch these interviews if you haven’t already.
Thank you to all who have helped us as we begin to deliberately curate a special quilting community. We remain committed to providing our readers with innovative and inspirational quilt related content and to fostering an inclusive community with our fellow makers.
Follow us on Instagram and subscribe to our mailing list to receive information about the different activities that Curated Quilts will be sponsoring to build a meaningful quilt community in 2021.
By Brittany Bowen Burton