I have re-started to offer hand quilting workshops here in Germany last year and at the beginning there was quite a lot of interest.
This weekend I received a message of one of the shop owners who organizes one of my workshops. She has to cancel it because there were no interest at all in attending. This is the second planned workshop for this year that must be cancelled due to that.
I must say I am a little disappointed. I know people still love to see hand quilting and other traditional crafts - but most of them don't want to learn and do it by themselves. They don't have the time or the money to attend a workshop, they call themselves too impatient for a craft like that and of course I hear many other good reasons. Well, I can understand them all - but I still feel a little disappointed.
I have earned some money with my workshops so I can pay the material for my quilts - now I will have to look around and find something else. Maybe I should enter more quilts at shows and win big awards! :D

I am sorry that your classes are being cancelled due to a loss of interest in hand quilting. Do you have knowledge in another area that you could teach in a class? Maybe you could teach something like applique or purse making. Good luck.

That's rotten. Maybe you could ask around local quilters, see if there are any who are interesting in hand-sewing but never got around to it? Quilting is a fairly slow, laborious process even by machine, and people who have already started quilting of some sort may be less put off by the idea of this slow but rewarding craft.

Of course, I am always hearing machine quilters who say that they could never imagine hand-sewing, so it may not work, but worth a shot?

Sooooo sorry! But with the quilts you make, you'll make a bundle! :thumbup: Hand work is sooo relaxing, its a shame that more individuals don't understand that. Handquilting and hand applique are both awesome to do at night when just relaxing watching the tv.

Wall hangings and panels are perfect display vehicles for hand quilting. A quilt may seem too large a project for newbies to think about. A potholder would be a good class project? What is on display at the quilt shops?

That's sad...I would take your class in a heartbeat. Good Luck with entering your quilts!!

Another project to show off hand quilting is the pillow. These are small take along projects that take less time to complete. Some quilters in the US are taking up hand piecing and quilting projects that they can work on while taking the kids to their sports practices and games or waiting in doctor offices, etc.

Pam M

Thank you for your nice comments! I am completely specialized on hand quilting and I do wholeclohts, so a lesson in appliqué is not what I can (or want to) do. The students in my workshops practice the technique on a small quilt which can also be used as a pillow cover - and I show my own quilts at the end of the day, so they I think they can't feel overstrained!
I would really love to do something like a trunk show or a lecture. People who are only interested in looking at hand quilted wholecloths could come and hear something about the quilt history, about the patterns etc. - and they don't have to do it by themselves. I have never heard that somebody does trunk shows here in Germany, so I don't know how people will react. Maybe I should think about it.

Sadly with the economy here in the US many don't have money for the extras , is it as hard right now in Germany ?

This would go well in the US, but I'm not sure about Germany - are there a lot of quilt guilds in your country?

I'm sorry there isn't interest in your classes. Maybe this is something where interest can build slowly?

Janet