There are so many quilting magazines.

Do you have a favorite and what is it you like about it?

I'm trying to find the "QuiltMaker" and am having a hard time finding it locally to look through it.

How many different magazines do you subscribe to?

When I first started subscribing to quilt magazines I probably tried a half dozen or so. :lol: It was a guilty pleasure! I found the patterns I chose to make usually came from "Quiltmaker." I do like Fons and Porter's magazine too. I just kept picking up magazines where ever I could find them (Jo Ann's, grocery store, book store) and then chose which ones I would subscribe to.

I like anything put out by mccalls the best.........just because for me they have the easiest directions to understand :D

I"m cheap. Each month I go to Borders and look at all the new quilting mags, then buy only the ones that have something I'm interested in. I've most cancelled all my magazine subscriptions when we went through a rought patch financially, and I've found that I really don't miss most of them.

I did a query on another forum and here are the results: First is the name of the magazine and then the number of people who liked it, and lastly how many issues per year:

Fons and Porter 6 6
Quiltmaker 4 6
Quilter's Newsletter 4 10
American Patchwork and Quilting (BHG) 3 12
Quilter's Home 1
The Quilter 2
Quilting Trends 1
Better Homes and Garden's Quilting 1
McCalls Quick Quilts 2


I ended up getting Quilt Maker and Fons and Porter as Christmas gifts. I do like them both. I received a sample from Quilter's Newsletter and it wasn't for me.

Yvonne, was that a guilty pleasure or a "QUILTY" pleasure? :lol: :lol: :roll: :roll: :D :D Pam W.

LOL! :lol:

Uh-Huh! :mrgreen:

I like Quilter's Newsletter the best of all the magazines. It is the only one I subscribe to. They always have a nice mix of articles, including articles about historical quilts, fabric, in addition to patterns.

Quilting Arts, Fabric Trends and $100,000 Challenge are my very, very favorites. They are the only ones I keep. I subscribe to way too many magazines and am paring them down one by one by not renewing my subscriptions. I used to love Quilters' Newsletter but under their new editorship(s), their focus seems to be more on traditional quilts and less on art and contemporary quilts.

Why buy expensive magazines when there is soooo much for free on the web, not only can you find written info, but there are lots of videos on utube etc. which I find easier to comprehend than reading instructions.I struggle to find magazines as they aren't available much in Spain, and usually indulge when I return to the U.K. for holidays, but I have such a wealth of information stored on this laptop for future use, and of course the money saved can be spent on fast growing fabric stash!! :lol: :lol:

I have both Mccalls and McCalls quick quilts. I have been subscribing for years. I find the directions very easy to understand. I have tried quiltmaker and quilters newsletter. I found that they weren't really for me so I stopped subscribing.

I buy a few magazines a month.maybe once aweek I'll pick up one. I subscribe to Quilters Home, but I don't really think of it as a quilty magazine it is more of enternment.(I met Mark Lipinski). I also like Faric Trends and the Challenge that comes out a few times a year. The women that won the $100,000 challenge 2007 lives near me and belongs to a neighboring guild.

I love the Australian Ones... they have very original designs, not too much advertising and very interesting stories!

Last time I looked, I prefered American Patchwork and Quilting. I got an Australian magazine as a gift last year, and that was fun.

In case you haven't figured it out by now, I strongly dislike the "celebrity culture" that seems to invade everything including quilting. I don't want to read articles about trendy designers - I want interesting and helpful articles and patterns. In fact, I really prefer tradition designs because of all the copyright issues involved when you make a quilt from a magazine pattern.

i enjoy quilting arts which i subscribe to as it is not available at the newsagents and buy down under quilts. I especially like reading about why people quilt and how their thought processes work from start to finish of a quilt. I usually flick through most of the magazines at the newsagents and occasionally also buy Australian quilters companion when have a bit of spare cash but my favourite is down under quilts for their articles as well as their art quilts.

I also enjoy "American Quilter" published by the American Quilters Society. That is another one I frequently keep.

Better Homes and Gardens Quilt Sampler is my favorite. I love all the shops and I've gotten ispiration from some of the quilts pictured on the walls and displays of the shops.

It is great to be able to get so many free things off the web! But it is also nice to fall asleep while reading a quilting magazine and have those images of new ideas to dream about!!!

I like to have them for when I have to drive my kids somewhere and I have to wait. Or in the waiting room of the Dr. office when the internet isn't available. Also, there is just something about having that paper in my hand, whether it be a magazine or a book, that I just enjoy.

Cathe, I too, like the AMERICAN PATCHWORK & QUILTING. They have easier patterns for me than some of the others I have subscribed to. Nancy

Cathe:
Last summer I went into our local Goodwill Store/St. Vincent de Paul/Salvation Army thrift stores looking for fruit jars for canning. I happened to go through the book section and found the Mother Lode of quilting books and magazines (and cookbooks!) that I spent about an hour perusing. I have decided these places are a great place to get magazines and books and they sell for about a quarter each to $ 1.99. You may be able to find some magazines at these stores and get a preview of what each magazine has to decide which you would want to subscribe to. A good way to TRY BEFORE YOU BUY. I personally get Fons and Porter and Quiltmaker and love both of them and have ACTUALLY made things out of each of the magazines I've gotten.

If you are looking for something different, try Mark Lipinski's Quilters Home.

Fabric Trends is also interesting. They feature different fabric lines and include a quilt pattern designed for each fabric line featured.

I also like McCalls and Fons & Porter.

Loretta:
I sure am interested in the history of the quilt blocks but have become somewhat disillusioned as I read alot about the quilt blocks of old being very instramental in directing slaves to Canada by the pattern, direction of the geese in a quilt, or where the arrows were pointing but have read recently that the black hisorians have no knowledge of such practices by the white folks who wanted to aid the blacks in getting out of the area where they were being enslaved. One article I read was in a Fons & Porter magazine (I think) kinda debunked the old "legends." ??????

I think there are some threads here about that issue, Feathers - there WERE no such legends until recently when a couple quilt books were published, making that false claim (that quilts were used in the abolitionist movement).

There are a lot of good websites about quilt history, Loretta. Some are more accurate than others, of course. :roll:

I used to get a little crochet magazine that had pictures of all the projects on the back cover.
If quilting mags would do this, they would have my business.
I canceled most of my quilt mags because it is just to much to find a pattern in dozens of mags.
I even asked Fons and Porter to put pics on the back cover but never got an answer. They would rather have the advertizing money for the back cover.