The 90s Collection
This is a group of small quilts (most are around 60cm or 24" square) by 49 different makers from around the UK. The pieces were commissioned by the various regions of the Guild throughout the whole of the 1990s and, viewed as a group, provide a picture of what was happening within patchwork and quilting during that period.
The techniques employed by the makers were wide-ranging and included hand and machine piecing, hand quilting, hand embroidery, machine quilting and machine embroidery, embellishment using beads and tassels and fabric manipulation. Most makers favoured cottons or silk fabrics, but more unusual items were also used including the plastics in House Block by Michelle Walker and the wine syphon tubing in Chaos by Leslie Morgan. A large number of the works also contained hand-dyed fabrics in addition to commercially available fabric.
Despite their small size many of these works reflect ideas and techniques being used by their makers in larger works at the time the piece was commissioned and so the collection accurately reflects the wider context of work by contemporary makers during the 1990s.
