Maggy Wilcox

Maggy Wilcox

OR97008-OSSDAR49

Maggy Wilcox

Nancy Burton

2009-10-29

Nine Patch Fabrics

Bend, Oregon

Nancy Burton

**This transcript was created by QSOS volunteers and was reviewed and, in some cases, edited by the interviewee. It may not exactly match the audio recording. For citations and interview quotations, please refer to the audio-recorded interview.** Nancy Burton (NB): This is Nancy Burton and I am conducting a Quilters' S.O.S. - Save Our Stories interview with Maggy Wilcox. Maggy Wilcox is a member of the Bend Chapter, so we are in Maggy Wilcox's home today. The date is September 29th, 2009, and it is 1:45 p.m. in the afternoon. We are doing this interview through the American Heritage Committee for the Oregon State Society, Daughters of the American Revolution. Maggy Wilcox is a member of the Bend Chapter, and Maggy Wilcox thank you so much to taking time this afternoon to speak with me. Tell me about the quilt that you chose for the interview.

Maggy Wilcox (MW): The quilt that I brought along is my first and only landscape which I decided I really enjoyed making. I took a picture of these hills outside Sedona, Arizona, a couple of years ago and took the pictures to a class where I started doing the landscape a year ago with one of the members of my quilt guild. It was really fun to do because it uses a lot of color, and though the flowers in the foreground were not original, you could take an artist's license and add flowers or add whatever you want to them. I had a really good instructor. She was a former home economics teacher so she had a lot of information that she could give to us. She had been quilting herself for many years. I call it "Geologic Gem" and can't think of a better name for it because that's what it is.

NB: Can you describe it for those that may be listening?

MW: Yes, I probably can. The hills are original to the photograph that I took. Using various shades of orange, I was able to cut the pieces into little rough cut strips that are not sewn in typical quilt fashion. They are sewn on top of each other so the edges are rough, and that is what I wanted. She had us gluing the pieces together but that's not a method that I think I would use again because it just didn't stay very long. The background behind the foreground is mountains, the background mountains look like they are at a distance because I was able to use a netting material to cover them, and that worked out really, really well. I started with a big bush design of material, and as you can see, there is a big bush on the left hand side, but I didn't like that bush after looking at it for several weeks on my design wall at home, so I changed the fabric completely that I was working with, and was much happier with it. It was a long process, but it was one that was a lot of fun for me to do.

NB: How long did it take you then?

MW: Months. [laughs.] I stretched it over several months because I kept going back to it. I just left it on the design wall, and I would change it here and there and work on it a half hour or an hour a day. There were a couple of days where I really worked on it for five or six hours but most of the time it was just a small amount of time until I really finished it. When I took it to my quilt guild for a show and tell, I got a lot of compliments on it so I am really very pleased with it. My first try that came out really well.

NB: What are the dimensions of the quilt?

MW: I don't remember exactly, but it looks like it is about two feet wide and by about 18 inches high so it fits in the corner.

NB: Tell me about the name.

MW: Well, it's geology. It's rocks so not a lot of deliberation. "Geologic Gem" seems to fit pretty well.

NB: Does it have a special meaning to you?

MW: All of it, I really enjoy landscapes like this. My husband and I take a lot of photographs and pictures of areas in the Southwest where we lived for about four years. It is the only place that really appeals to me. Sedona is a fabulous and beautiful place.

NB: Why did you choose this quilt pattern of layering landscape?

MB: Because I like this process of layering better than traditional quilting. I really enjoyed this, and I know I'm going to do more. I have three or four books just on landscape quilting, and I just have to get back to it after this summer some time.

NB: Can you compare the quilting actually--the landscape quilting with the regular quilting?

MW: Regular quilting that is traditional quilting is more in block form, and blocks to me are not very exciting. They get very tiresome after awhile. I do one quilt in one style of block, and that's it. I never want to do it again. I want to do something different each time, and landscape quilting you can do something totally different every single time.

NB: What method do you use for the small little pieces in the front?

MW: Oh. I just take little pieces of fabric and cut the pieces into little shapes that really don't mean too much but look, from a distance, like little flowers. When you get really close, you know that they are not. From a distance they look like flowers, and so they are just fun shapes, nothing in particular. Then I glue them down, and I sew them.

NB: If someone were to look at your quilt, what do you think they would think of you as a quilter? [inaudible.]

MW: That I enjoy bright colors, because this is bright. I really do enjoy lively colors in my quilts, and just about all of the quilts I have done have been very bright.

NB: How do you use it?

MW: This particular landscape just rests comfortably on the wall above my computer in my little office upstairs. I just enjoy looking at it everyday.

NB: So, do you have any plans for the quilt in the future?

MW: Nope, I just enjoy it. I'm not going to give it away. I've no plans to give it away.

NB: Now tell me about your interest in quiltmaking altogether.

MW: Oh, it started a long, long time ago, but I really didn't start working on quilts until probably nine years ago now. I made my first quilt, shooting from the hip, back in 1970 or 1971, when one of my friends had a baby and asked me to be the godmother. I thought, 'Oh, I'd better give a present to this little baby.' I thought, 'What can I do?' I knew how to make clothes, but I didn't want to make baby clothes, so I thought, 'Let's try a quilt.' In those days, there wasn't a machine that did quilting. At least one that I'd ever heard of, so I just went to the fabric store and bought bunches of fabric.

I knew I had to have something for the inside, the batting, but there was no batting in those days that I could find. I used two layers of cotton flannel. There was no rotary cutter in those days. I just cut squares with scissors and laid them out on my floor, which was my design wall in those days. I sewed them together, added the flannel for the interior and sewed a large piece on the back. I stitched the layers together along the seam lines. I couldn't even remember what it looked like. Then I discovered that my friend still has the quilt. She took a picture of it and sent it to me. It's very faded, but she kept it all those years, and it's never fallen apart so machine quilting was a good way to hold it together. It got a lot of use, she said.

NB: So, you started the process.

MW: Yes, but I didn't make another quilt until 1990 when we lived in Santa Fe. I took a class at the community college there, Santa Fe Community College extension program. The quilt was very small, but that was my introduction to rotary cutters, cutting mats, plastic rulers all designed for cutting fabric quickly and evenly. It was my introduction to all the modern methods of quiltmaking that we use today. The class wasn't large, and I learned a lot from the teacher. I discovered that there was one fabulous quilt shop in Santa Fe and shopped there. That quilt shop did a lot of business I'm sure, but I didn't really start working hard at it until I moved here.
I met one of my neighbors who is in a quilt guild. She invited me to join her for quilt guild meeting. I was so impressed with all the fabulous quilts that were shown at the show and tell at every meeting. It was exciting because it seemed like it was possible to make them yourself and produce beautiful, beautiful quilts. Some of those ladies write books about quilting and the teach classes. They share what they know about quilting so it's really fun. I don't put as much time into it as a lot of people do, but I work at it. And, it gets better after many years.

NB: Did you really learn on your own or did you have a quilting instructor?

MW: In Santa Fe, I took the quilting class at the community college and then I worked on my own. I didn't really think about doing a large quilt, but I should have. That probably would have helped me advance a little more quickly, but fortunately I joined the group in Sunriver. The guild decided to do what they called Quilting 101. They taught us the basics of quilting. I didn't miss one class. I learned so much from them; they encouraged us to buy books and take classes. They still encourage everybody, no matter how much you already know, to be taking their classes because of the things you can find out. In the class, you don't just learn what the teacher is teaching, you talk with other people in the class and you learn from them. Of course, that is what has really been beneficial for me, and I've learned so much more than I'd ever known. I'm learning from other people, and I'm learning from books. I'm experimenting on my own and, of course, I make mistakes as everybody does. You give the mistakes away or throw them away, ha ha, whatever.

NB: How many hours do you think you have spent on the quilt?

MW: I have no idea. I couldn't even begin to guess, because I did a little bit of it over a period of months.

NB: So are you working on other projects?

MW: I haven't done much this summer, but I do have one on my quilt wall upstairs. I took a class at the Sisters Quilter's Affair with Judy Johnson, but I haven't done anything on that since then. I've been making little things like pot holders or table runners and so forth for the practice.

NB: What is your first quilt memory?

MW: My first quilt memory. Well, my mother was not a quilter, but she was a seamstress. She taught me the basics of sewing. I remember that we had an old quilt that she wanted to put a cover on. I helped her with the cover, tying the quilt. I've only tied one quilt since then because I don't enjoy the looks of tied quilts. But that is what women were doing probably in the times of the '20s or '30s so I think that was probably my first memory, tying a quilt with her, just putting a cover on it with her.

NB: Are there any members of your family that are quiltmakers?

MW: No. Oh, I'm sorry. I am told that I do have a cousin that I don't know well. I haven't seen her since I was 24. I was told that she is a quilter. She lives in another state, and I haven't seen her in all these years but she is a quilter.

NB: How does quilting affect your family?

MW: It has to do with buying fabric, [laughs.] I buy fabric, and then he looks at it and says, 'What! More fabric?' Nearly every quilter has some kind of stash, and I have a small stash by quilter's standards. He has not discouraged me though, and whenever we have gone places, because we travel, and we see a fabric store, he always says, 'Do you want to go in?' So, he is very encouraging. The kids are gone. There are just the two of us at the house. The one thing that is negative is that he chooses to give me his critique long before I am ready for it. He does that with everything I make. I have told him that he can critique after I finish it. 'When I ask for your advice, then you can give it.' He enjoys what I do, and when I make something new, he then asks where am I going to put it now. [laughs.]

NB: How does he like fact that we are talking about the "Geologic Gem"?

MW: Oh, he likes that. As I said the first one that I originally had there, he didn't care for. He really criticized it, but that is when I really went for it, and told him, 'Criticize it when it's finished and not before.'

NB: This question asks if you have ever used quilts to get through a difficult time.

MW: No. No, not at all, I know that some people do, especially people who are going through things like chemotherapy and that sort of thing you know, or a person who might have a severe illness and [inaudible.] and hopefully it never does.

NB: Can you tell me about an amusing experience that has occurred from your quiltmaking?

MW: Oh dear, I've never tied anything to quilting. Amusing? Guess I'm not prepared for that one. Can't think of anything I've done.

NB: I think you can relate too. What do you really find the most pleasing about quiltmaking?

MW: The beauty of the fabrics. And, being able to, well, the challenge of putting them together. Art is not anything that I have ever excelled in. At least not that I've ever thought of and I've never taken classes in it even in high school because we didn't have an art program in those days, but the fabrics that are produced these days are so incredibly beautiful that I just love working with them. I go into a fabric store just to feel inspired and because they are so beautifully organized. I think the people that own the shops do a wonderful job displaying their quilts on the walls and displaying their fabrics. It is just a real pleasure to play with fabric and the colors.

NB: So what aspects of quiltmaking don't you like?

MW: Well, that is one reason that I don't like traditional quilts, because sewing little pieces of fabric together takes a lot of time and is monotonous. Traditional quilts often times are a lot of little pieces of fabric sewn together, and it's monotonous. Some people love that, but I just don't like it. When I used to teach school years ago I couldn't do well with teaching the same thing three times in a row. I had to change it every time; I got bored so quickly.

NB: Tell me about your art or quilt guilds that you belong to and their names and how many people belong to them?

MW: The quilt guild is in Sunriver, and it's called the Mountain Meadow Quilters. I just read on our most recent list that we have about 124 members, all women, although there are some quilt guilds in some parts of the country that have men. We don't happen to have any. This particular guild meets twice a month in mostly Sunriver, depending upon what we do. The first meeting has a program with outstanding quilters from around the Northwest in particular and sometimes just our own women who do wonderful programs. Then, the second meeting is our workshop. That's where those of us who are still learning can really pick up a lot of information. It's just for so little money, I've learned so much from these women, and of course, they are a lot of fun, too. They are very enjoyable to work with on things, and they are very forgiving, too. Everybody applauds every quilt that is shown with show and tell no matter how amateurish it might look. Nobody who does amateurish work will show theirs, because they are too embarrassed to even--some of the quilts are just fabulous because the women just do outstanding work. There is an art group that call themselves the Sewjourners. They challenge each other.

NB: How do they express it through their art? Explain a little bit more about that, it is quilting related or--

MW: These women are producing art quilts. They are so good; they are very advanced quilters. They will do all kinds of quilts, and many of them do the traditional block quilting, but they also do art quilts. Some of them belong to another offshoot called the Appliqué group. Appliqué is something I haven't really spent any time learning. Hand appliqué that is. I've done a little machine appliqué, but these women in the art group are just fantastic quilters.

NB: What is appliqué?

MW: Appliqué is fabric on top of another and sewn down. You can do it with hand sewing, hiding the stitches, or you can do it with machine stitching, and the stitches will show. I have a little pillow that I made at a machine quilting class that I took in Sisters a few years ago. It's just a fun little thing then this summer while I was taking a class at the Quilters Affair. The teacher showed us the basics about hand appliqué. I don't know if I can do this. It takes time and practice.

NB: What advantages in technology influenced your work?

MW: Oh, it's just amazing, the sewing machine in particular. When I started quilting nine years ago, I had a sewing machine that I bought in 1970, and it was a wonderful sewing machine, but it was not set up for quilting. For instance, you have what is called a walking foot that you have on a sewing machine for quilting, and that in itself has been a real blessing because I didn't have one on the other machine, I was not able to produce a perfectly straight quilted seam. So, the sewing machine in itself was a real advance in technology. Then the development of the rotary cutter instead of scissors to cut fabric means that you have nice straight edges on your fabric that aren't jagged at all. Of course the mats that go with the rotary cutters mean that you can cut on the surface and not cut the table. I don't know what the name of the mat material is, but it's some kind of tech synthetic material. Then, there are wonderful threads. We had a class a couple of months ago just on threads. It was quite an experience just learning about all the different kinds of qualities of threads and what to look for when we are buying threads. Now I look at the thread that I have in my thread boxes, and I say, 'Okay, which ones am I going to keep, and which ones am I going to throw out?'

NB: Can you distinguish or tell what types there are? I mean what makes one better than the other?

MW: That depends on what you are making. You use a different thread for a different product. Some of my friends, for instance, who quilt say they would not use polyester on a baby quilt because polyester thread is really tough and can become loose on a quilt. A baby can get his finger caught in it. I don't know how true that is, but that is what they think. I have always used cotton thread on baby quilts. Egyptian cotton thread is usually a better thread than the shorter threads. I discovered that a good quality thread, that I didn't used to use because I didn't know the difference, doesn't break as easily. Poorer thread would knot when it shouldn't. So, I've been sewing with a good quality thread which doesn't knot up nor break, and I really appreciate that. I just bought a new light this year that attaches to the side of my sewing machine; I can actually shine the light directly on my work. I can bend it all over the place; it's called bendable light, or something or other. It is a wonderful light for someone's eyes that are getting older. [laughs.] I can't get along without a good light.

NB: What are your favorite techniques and what are your favorite materials?

MW: Favorite techniques? I don't know what that is.

NB: Do you have a special way that you sew that would be a little more unusual that another person's?

MW: I am still experimenting with everything so that there is no one way that I really like. What was the second part of your question?

NB: The second question is what are your absolute favorite materials that you used for your project?

MW: High quality cotton fabrics from good quilt shops--quilt shops buy the best fabrics. The higher pricing is definitely worth it. And, I really enjoy handling good quality cotton fabrics. The cheaper cotton fabrics look cheaper and are rougher; they don't have the same feel to them. Some of my friends don't wash their fabrics first because they'd much rather get the feel of the sizing or what ever it is they want with the fabrics, but I wash mine. If I am ever going to wash them as a quilt, then I want to see how they come out. I am going to experiment with other kinds of fabrics that are, um, what's the word? But, of course, the word is gone. I do have some silk fabrics that I want to experiment with but they are just scraps.

NB: Tell me about the place where you do all your designing and what your studio is like. Where you do all that creating?

MW: In a room upstairs in a house that we did not design--we bought it already made. The woman that lived in the house prior to us designed the house; she designed the room. Because she sewed and did all kinds of crafts, the floors are ceramic. It's not wall to wall carpeting; I would have preferred hardwood, but I think this is just fine. I have to share the room with my husband because he ties flies for fishing, and he reloads his own shot gun shells for his skeet shooting on Tuesday mornings. [laughs.] It's also a guest room when we have more than enough company for one bedroom. It's a quiet a studio, if you want to call it that. It's just a real room where I have my fabrics and all my stuff: cutting table, my sewing machine, and ironing board.

NB: It's in one place?

MW: It is in one place, and that is something that I've never had before. Even when we lived in Santa Fe, I didn't have a separate room for that. I sewed in my very large bedroom.

NB: Tell me how you balance your time, from making beds to other things.

MW: I don't do too much sewing in the summer time because I spent more time outside in my garden. We have one third of an acre of land that, outside, is a lot of garden that has to be taken care of which the previous owner installed. So I do a lot more gardening in the summer time, more than the rest of the time. I tend to sew when I have to sew in the summer time, for instance, for the bazaar. [inaudible.] I needed to make some things for that. My son was married in May, and I had to take something as a hostess gift to his new mother-in-law, so I made a Japanese inspired table runner out of some fabrics that I had. In the winter time, I will take classes; usually the classes or the product from a class, [inaudible.] that I study in the class. I took the class just because I wanted to know those things.

NB: You mentioned that you use a design wall. Can you tell me about it?

MW: A design wall is simply a large wall with no windows in the middle of it, where you can attach the fabric to the wall. You can buy foam core board and attach that to the wall, but what I have is just a fabric, large fabric that I have attached to the wall and cotton fabrics stick to it. So, it's just like glue. You can take the fabric right off foam core board, too, and then if I want things to stay more permanent, I can just put some staples into it. My wall is just simple wall board so I can take the pins out, and the holes disappear.

NB: So, your whole process starts how?

MG: Well, the wall itself is just a surface. When I decide to make something to put on the wall, it depends on the class I'm taking or whatever I feel I want to do. And, as for fabrics, I'll just select some fabrics to work with out of what is here. With the landscape, I bought a variety of fabrics that I thought would suit that particular design that I was doing so that meant the different colors that I was looking for. After looking at a picture that I would want to use, I would cut around the fabric and just put it on the wall and experiment, shaping it by just moving it around. Some people start with drawing, and in a way, I did start with drawing because I took the picture that I wanted to use, then I freehand sketched the outline of the rocks which helped to instill the shape of them into my head. When I started cutting the fabric, it wasn't as difficult as it might have been if I had not started drawing it first.

Now you can just copy something from a book, too. There are hundreds of books on the market. It's just amazing how many books there are. You can use the patterns in the book, or you can just design something on your own, depending on your taste. The quilt that is in the other room, that I can show you later, was one that I made in a class with Guatemalan fabrics. I bought my own fabrics, too, but the teacher was from Guatemala, and she brought Guatemalan fabrics. She gave us six sample quilts to look at that she had made. Then I just started working with the size of the fabric that she had given me, I decided to do blocks and use color as my variation in the quilt. None of the blocks is exactly the same because the fabric colors are all so different and yet the design for each block looks the same.

NB: So, on your design wall, you start basically with sticking shapes of cut art material and then just adjust them and move them around according to how you want them to work. Does that sound right?

MW: It's like a puzzle--just move fabric around. Everybody has a different way of doing it, you know. That's pretty much how I've done it so far. Sometimes I'll just sketch something out. I don't worry too much about the sketches; I may change my mind totally.

NB: When you are using the design wall, how does it--you just answered what I was going to ask about. How it is going to affect your creative process when you are using the design wall? Do you change as you go along, or do you stick pretty much to your plan?

MW: Well, I seldom to stick to my plan. I may not like what I originally planned, and if I don't like it, there is not much hope to sticking with it. I may switch and do something different. The Guatemalan quilt went together very quickly because, and I was really surprised, because once I had decided what I wanted to do, I had enough variety of fabric that I had brought to the class that I was able to pursue that without buying anything extra. When I came home, I looked at what I had in my stash and was able to add a few pieces to it. So, that was one time when I did stick to my plan; it was rare. I almost never stick to my plan, I love to change things.

NB: You just say that is probably how your process works?

MW: Oh, yes, definitely.

NB: What makes a good quilt?

MW: Boy. That's a tough one for me because I am such a novice. A good quilt is the one that wins contests. The quilts that win are the great quilts. I really enjoy color, so I think color is really very important and the way that people put the colors together. The quality of workmanship is really important, and yet it's not the be all and end all of a quilt. So, if it doesn't come out right, that's all right, but the color is what makes it a beautiful quilt and how the colors are put together. One of the women in our guild did a fantastic landscape quilt from a picture, I think, that her brother-in-law had taken of bears on Kodiak Island in Alaska. She used fabric paint to start; she created the bears coming out of the woods walking around the stones in front of the water. She painted the fabric then did a lot of machine quilting. She won the People's Choice prize at the Pacific Northwest Quilters Quiltfest. Everybody sure liked her quilt.

NB: So she used a quilting process on fabric, she painted her animals, and then is part of that process appliqué?

MW: I don't think that she probably used appliqué. It was machine quilted. I have not seen it for over a year, now, so I don't remember exactly if she also used appliqué.

NB: Which process do you prefer, the hand quilting or the machine quilting?

MW: I do not do any hand quilting.

NB: What do you think makes a quilt artistically powerful? You mentioned color is there anything else that you can still think of?

MW: The design. The actual quilting process is pretty amazing. We have a couple of women in our quilt guild who can take a piece of fabric, and with their quilting skills and their sewing skills, they can create a beautiful piece of work. With just one piece of fabric they can machine quilt or hand quilt. That's an unusual quilt, but it's quite a skill.

NB: Do you complete each quilt yourself?

MW: I have so far, I've never made a bed sized quilt. We have a king sized bed, which is huge. My husband has asked me to make a quilt, and I've said, 'No. I would never try to quilt it myself. There are people who do this.' I would piece it then take it to a longarm quilter just because it's so huge. There is no way that I can quilt without a longarm machine.

NB: We were talking about this lady whose work you enjoy, is there anyone in particular whose work you've really gone to copy?

MW: No. I think there was one lady who lives in this area that had a quilt in a quilt show a few months ago. She is a member of Mt. Bachelor Quilt Guild. She produces some really fine picture quilts and does just absolutely fantastic work.

NB: Do you think that she is someone that could have referenced your appreciation and desire to your own [inaudible.]

MW: Well, if I had seen her work before I got started, yes. I started my landscape design before I saw her work. I really appreciate what she had done; it's beautiful.

NB: Why is quiltmaking important to your life Maggy?

MW: It is a creative process that I'd never pursued. I've made clothes for myself, and then I had two kids and worked full time. I didn't take the time to work at this creative process. I have worked at writing, and at some stage decided that nobody would buy my writing - forget that. It just doesn't work. I have enjoyed quilting because it is something that I can learn. I really enjoy the struggle, and it is a struggle, too, because the creative process is a struggle for me. I imagine it is for any artist, but it really is for me because I have no training whatsoever.

NB: What do you think of the importance of quilts in American life?

MW: Well, they were a necessity a long time ago. People had to have something to keep them warm when they were sleeping. People didn't have much money, so they saved everything. Making fabric was very time-consuming, the looming process, I'm sure, so they became a treasure for many generations. When you look at what our great-grandmothers, not mine, but what other people's great-grandmothers have made--one appreciates those things, at least I always have. I've always appreciated family antiques. I haven't any quilts from my family, but I have chinaware, furniture, glassware, books and old clocks--things like that. I really appreciate something that's old and from our families [inaudible.]

NB: You can tie this into the history of women quilts in America and did this influence you?

MW: I have a great appreciation for all things women's movements have accomplished years ago.

NB: Are you planning to pass these things down to your children and grandchildren?

MW: Hopefully, I'll have grandchildren that I can pass the knowledge onto. I'm not sure that my daughter-in-law can sew enough to pursue quilting, but there is always a possibility.

NB: Maggy, I am going to say that our time is up and I really appreciate your comments and all your education. I'll bring this to a close, and I thank you very much.