with your own idea for how to put those tools (whether they be words or blocks) together, it is copyrighted, period

You don't have to apply for a copyright?????

does McCalls own your pattern after it is published in a magazine??? are you allowed to sell it or quilts from it???

Thank you so much for the mention of the hard work designers put in. It takes weeks of work to finalize a design, find fabric that will be current when the magazine comes out, make decisions about how many bolts of each of the fabrics to buy in order to kit it. And, sometimes it doesn't sell as much as the quilt before it, leaving us with fabrics we have already paid for....we can't send it back. Just one bolt of fabric is from $70 to $80 and my last quilt had 10 fabrics in it. By the way, most of those fabrics required from 4 to 5 bolts to kit a reasonable number of kits. This is my job, I don't have another. Should my ideas and designs be free for anyone to make and sell without even a breath of credit given to me. There seems to be a great deal of anger over the fact that designers want credit for designing the quilts. Thank you so much for your defense of our right to get credit for the design. And you are right, sometimes it is discouraging to not only have people to profit from the fruits of my labor, but to do it knowing it isn't legal.

I still believe that when a quilt is made from someones pattern you should give that person recognition. I still plan on including their name and name of quilt on my labels. If I didn't design it I shouldn't get that credit. Of course I put my name for making and quilting it. And yes, I have thought of doing a follow-up to them. That whole article seemed like scare tactics to me and I can't understand why someone is so set on scaring people that way. I wonder where she got her info from or if these are just her feelings about copyright.

That is a really good question and not one that I knew the answer to until I went through the process with McCall's. I never lose my copyright, McCall's never owns it. I sign a contract saying that they have permission to publish it, but you will notice that not only does McCall's give us credit for the design, they include our pictures and give credit to the maker and quilter. I retain the copyright and they have provided quilters with my Email address so that the okay to show the pattern in a fair or use it to raffle off to raise money is mine to give They do that because I own the right to do that and the answer without exception has been yes. I can't publish the pattern for 4 months after it is released. I always buy at least 50 magazines to use as patterns if I teach a class on the quilt. Thank you for the question.

Oh, my. Thank you. I don't want to be the bad guy here. I have designed dozens of quilts at no cost, not even for the color copy ink it takes to print the quilt and all the blocks and measurements. I do it for individual quilters, friends and most recently for a group of ladies who wanted a quilt to raffle off to honor a member of their group that lost her arm and shoulder to cancer. I designed the quilt, called Northcott who generously donated the fabric and then was invited to help make the quilt. I just love to design, but before P&B Textiles and McCall's started publishing my quilts only a few people even saw, much less made quilts I designed.

If I designed a pattern to sell, I would have no problem with the person that bought that pattern if she wanted to make money off of making it and selling. I got what I wanted for it when she bought the pattern. But I wouldn't want her passing the pattern around to her friends to do the same. I'd lose the money from those women who didn't buy the pattern. So I can respect that as a copyright law.

Nor was I, interesting.

I can't say that I have seen a whole lot anger over designers wanting credit for their work - just the degree of control they want over the finished quilt. I am just a newbie quilter, but I include both the designer's name and the name of the pattern on my labels and am more than happy to pay a fair price for the pattern.

I also have a friend who designs quilts for a living, and does pretty well at it too, so I understand that designers need to get a fair return for their efforts.

Oh, what a treasure. Thank you for that. I had loads of calls stating that they bought that issue just for that quilt. I don't need that to keep designing, I'll do that until I can't see anymore, but it was really lovely of you to say. By the way, was it Oh What a Beautiful Morning that is out now or So Blissful in the last issue. No matter, when you get ready to make that quilt, please call me and I will give you a kit and it will be my pleasure. Dorothy Ann