eQuilter Blog

This week I’d like to share the work of a quilt artist whom I admire.

Niraja Lorenz recently had several works in the Lincoln Center gallery in Fort Collins Colorado. I’ve appreciated her work for awhile, so jumped at the chance to go see several of her pieces in this gallery 1 hour north of here. It is very difficult to choose which one to share, so enjoy this one, and I will share more work from this gallery on my photo pages.

From the artist statement:

“Inspired by both science and spirituality, Niraja’s art flows through her, teaching her about uncertainty. Chaos Theory has influenced her to see the world as fluid and unfolding, unpredictable yet not random.

She works primarily with solid-colored commercial and hand-dyed cotton. Using subtle variations of color and value, she pieces together thousands of bits of fabric, many less than an inch square and lines 1/4″ wide.

From a distance her creations can be interpreted in many ways: a magnification of microscopic particles, the vastness of space, a cross-section through the Earth, an aerial view of a cosmopolitan area, or all of these in one piece. Up close, her quilts reveal unexpected intricacies as ever more subtle layers of astonishing details are discovered.

After years of creating original pieces, she studied with Nancy Crow in 2007. Her work quickly evolved as she discovered that she had a unique visual voice.”

And yes, all those tiny stripes and snips are pieced solids. So for Niraja, and all of you who love to sew and cut up, and sew and cut up and sew some more….we keep our solid categories stocked!

Sharing our passion for fabric…..
Luana and Paul

Travel/Lecture Dates:
Feb 25 – Mar 5 – Solo Gallery @ Kyoto Quilt Festival Feb 28 – Mar 2
Apr 3-6 – SAQA Conference – St Pete, Florida
April 23-25 – Washington DC
April 27- May 3 – Alegre Retreat

Visit eQuilter’s Instagram, Pinterest or TikTok pages for Color and Design ideas.

See Luana’s Flickr Photo Pages for travel images, comment on our blog, or follow us on Facebook.

Check out our Video pages for interviews and show reviews.

Here’s an important deadline for one of your quilt projects:

July 4th, 2026

This is the upcoming 250th anniversary of our Independence Day. It is known as the Semiquincentennial, but I call it the Semi-Quin because I am finishing my 3rd quilt for this huge event.

After attending the AQSG event last year, I realized that 50 and 100 years from now, there will be people studying and admiring the Semi-Quin quilts we make today.

Would you like to join me?

In honor of Black History Month, I’d like to share with you one of the 2 quilts I’ve made for a Semi-Quin exhibit at the Virginia Quilt Museum next year.

It was inspired by a visit to Mount Vernon last year. Because my brother works as an architect in Washington DC, and because I love to visit the museums and historic sites in our nation’s capital, I go to Wash DC about once a year. This was my 4th visit to Mt Vernon over several decades. I have focused on different topics each time I visit, by signing up for a guided tour.

This time I signed up for a relatively new tour – The Enslaved People of Mount Vernon. Honestly I had no idea that over 500 slaves lived and worked at Mt Vernon during George Washington’s lifetime. So I decided to make a quilt about this, because I figured others would appreciate learning this important piece of American history.

I have also made a quilt about the Wild Ponies of Assateague Island for this exhibit, and I am finishing a larger quilt now to celebrate the 250 years of precious American Wilderness.

Details:
I used Golden Fluid Acrylics on an Evolon background. Then I freemotion stitched the architectural details, the red calligraphy is a freemotion satin stitch, then created the figures and trees with fused applique, and did more freemotion stitching to finish. It is 20″ x 20″ – stitched on Bernina 790 and Q20.

What do you think is important to put in a quilt, for our 250th Anniversary?
Please join me!

Sharing our passion for fabric…..
Luana and Paul

Travel/Lecture Dates:
Feb 25 – Mar 5 – Solo Gallery @ Kyoto Quilt Festival Feb 28 – Mar 2
Apr 3-6 – SAQA Conference – St Pete, Florida
April 23-25 – Washington DC
April 27- May 3 – Alegre Retreat

Visit eQuilter’s Instagram, Pinterest or TikTok pages for Color and Design ideas.

See Luana’s Flickr Photo Pages for travel images, comment on our blog, or follow us on Facebook.

Check out our Video pages for interviews and show reviews.

We are zooming into February which is a short month with a sweet holiday in the middle –
Valentine’s Day is on the horizon!

It is also Black History month, and I am highlighting 2 books in stock by Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi:
And Still We Rise: Race, Culture, and Visual Conversations
Visioning Human Rights in the New Millennium

We have a TON of new blenders this week – it is a good time to check out our New Color Palette category. (which is updated every week!)

Please note also that our 40″ wide Evolon (sold by the yard) is back in stock. We also carry sample packs, and 80″ wide. If you follow my artwork, my last few pieces have had painted Evolon tops! (with applique and then stitching on top of the painted Evolon.)

I am also using Gentle Fuse to cut detailed shapes on batiks and other fabrics, with my Silhouette Cameo digital cutting machine, and 54″ Mistyfuse for my larger art quilts. (For those of you who have been asking.)

In case you missed it – check out “Just Wanna Copyright – For Makers” by Elizabeth Townsend. The corresponding exhibit just opened at the New England Quilt Museum.

There has been much discussion about the SAQA Red exhibit this last week. If you are curious, we still have this exhibit catalog in stock here.

We are still collecting comfort quilts for those who lost their homes during Hurricane Helene in NC. You can either drop donations off *in person* at our office, or ship directly to this NEW address for distribution:

Shannon Townsend
57 Eden Glen Rd
Black Mountain, NC 28711

sharing your love for fabric,
Luana and Paul

Travel/Lecture Dates:
Feb 20-23 – QuiltCon – eQuilter is a Sponsor!
Feb 25 – Mar 5 – Kyoto Quilt Festival – Luana’s Solo Gallery
Apr 3-6 – SAQA Conference – St Pete, Florida
April 27- May 3 – Alegre Retreat

Visit eQuilter’s Instagram, Pinterest or TikTok pages for Color and Design ideas.

See Luana’s Artist Blog, Flickr Photo Pages for travel images, comment on our blog, or follow us on Facebook.

Check out our Video pages for interviews and show reviews.

For most of us, cats are never-ending source of comfort and amusement. Many of you have found your way to my “Fabriholic Kitty Club” on Facebook, despite the zillions of other cat-themed pages. Our friend Doug from Kona Bay Fabrics advised me, our first year of business – “Cats outsell dogs 3-to-1” – haha and he was right! In our house we don’t have to decide whether we like cats or dogs better, because we have 2 dogs, and 3 rescue cats. Our daughter Sophie Quinn adopted a 5 yr old calico tortie several months ago, and she texts me cute photos of her furry friend, in the middle of the night. And I don’t mind! So for those of you fellow ailurophiles (cat lovers) I thought I should feature this embarrassment of feline riches in our warehouse right now.

I love spotting wildlife in our suburban rural neighborhood, and in our Rocky Mountains. I travel one mile from our house, past Celestial Seasonings tea factory, to our warehouse. About once a week I have some kind of wildlife sighting, like a fox, raccoon, or hawk. A week ago a pair of Bald Eagles flew right over my car! Today I had a little bunny next to my car. We’ve had a pair of Blue Jays in our back yard this week also. Occasionally we’ll have a bear or bobcat wander through. A little closer to the foothills our neighbors see plenty of deer, and the rare wandering mountain lion. We feel so fortunate to live in a place where our lives sometimes overlap with the wild creatures around us.

Speaking of snakes…

As I write this, it is Chinese New Year’s Eve….Jan 29 is the start of the Lunar New Year. It is the year of the Snake. When I lived in Hong Kong there were elaborate parties and fireworks, and we shouted “Gung Hei Fat Choi” as we skipped through the celebrations out on the streets. Later we experienced the Lunar Year in Honolulu’s Chinatown, when visiting Paul’s family there. And of course when Sophie Quinn was small and taking Mandarin lessons, we would book a table at the local Chinese restaurant for the New Year Lion Dance or Dragon Dance. The giant Lion puppet would bob up and down, with 3 or 4 (or more!) puppet-masters, to the beat of the celebratory drums. They are meant to scare away evil spirits, and bring good luck in the new year.

Gung Hei Fat Choi!

I wish you purring kitties and good luck in the Year of the Snake.

Sharing our passion for fabric…..
Luana and Paul

Travel/Lecture Dates:
Feb 25 – Mar 5 – Solo Gallery @ Kyoto Quilt Festival Feb 28 – Mar 2
Apr 3-6 – SAQA Conference – St Pete, Florida
April 27- May 3 – Alegre Retreat

Visit eQuilter’s Instagram, Pinterest or TikTok pages for Color and Design ideas.

See Luana’s Flickr Photo Pages for travel images, comment on our blog, or follow us on Facebook.

Check out our Video pages for interviews and show reviews.