Dear Readers:

I got back from India early this month with more than souvenirs and memories. I had serious intestinal issues while there, then a cold that morphed into pneumonia when I got home. I'm on the mend now, but it's been a slow slog. In this issue, I'll share some of my textile adventures. As a bonus, the juicy giveaway for April is two colorful scarves I brought back from India for you guys.

Also in this issue, I share information about some special opportunities to study with Gee's Bend quilters and a new initiative on "community quilts" at the Quilt Index. Have you ever made a commemorative quilt for a local or national milestone anniversary? Have you ever made a patriotic quilt? Are you making a quilt for the 250th anniversary of our country? If you answered yes to any of these questions, the Index would love to include it in their digital archive.

There's been a lot of coverage about fast and drastic changes to global tariffs. Some of the stiffer tariff increases are hitting countries where quilting cotton and quilting tools are typically produced and/or printed. This is expected to cause price hikes in quilt shops soon so I'll be researching this issue. If you are experiencing big price increases and were told tariffs are the reason, I'd love for you to drop me a line at meg@megcox.com.

Let me also say Thank You to the subscribers who have mailed generous quantities of your "previously loved" fabric to the Philadelphia quilt shop I wrote about last month that is mostly focused on new young quilters. Cut & Sew store owner Melissa Clouser-Missett recently posted a photo on social media of some of that donated fabric which turned out to be the perfect backing for one of her student's quilts.

Quilt On,

Meg

Important Revivals Of India's Textile Traditions

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This was my third textile trip to India and despite getting sick for the first time in that country, it won't be my last. This was my second trip with Marigold Textiles, Art and Adventure Tours led by Australian quilter Pam Holland and Jaipur-based Govind Agrawal and my first time in Central India. We took a deep dive into India's spiritual traditions, including in Varanasi, the holiest city on the planet for Hindus. And I love that this Textiles & Temples trip took us far beyond major cities into rural villages to visit weavers and dyers.

I could give a lecture or write a book about this incredible haven for textile-lovers, and maybe someday I will. But for simplicity, today I'm just going to focus on one of the places we visited because I think it tells you a lot about the overall trends and priorities in the country. Although we visited weavers in other towns including Varanasi, Maheswar, and Ujjain (and we did some big city shopping in Delhi at the start), I want to focus on a small village called Prampur outside the ancient city of Chanderi.

Chanderi is known for an 11th-century fort and for long being a center of weaving, especially very fine silk saris. About 60% of the current population is involved in the weaving trade in some way. Although the local government is trying hard to build Chanderi's reputation as a tourist destination, I must tell you that it's hard to find a decent hotel and they've even tried things like "luxury tents" to put tourists up. But what impressed me was all the ways that weaving is being encouraged, preserved, supported and advertised as a major draw, here and elsewhere in India.

I read that there are an estimated 35 million handloom workers in India (according to the 2020 All-India Handloom Census) and 88% of them are in rural areas. Prampur was designated India's first Handloom Tourism Village in the state of Madhya Pradesh about 20 years ago and its weaving traditions go back centuries. We walked down a long narrow street crowded with goats, cows and small children. The mostly cement homes are painted in pastel colors accented with popular weaving patterns painted in contrasting colors, a project undertaken by local design students when the tourism program began.

To see the village, here's an excellent article with lots of photos from a tourism publication. And here is another with close-up photos of some Prampur weavers at their work.

As we proceeded along the street, we were able to visit multiple homes and see weavers working inside on looms. Most were weaving silk saris. These wrap-around garments are 9 yards long and take between 3 days and 3 months to complete, depending on the complexity of their design. Our guide was a local historian from a long line of weavers who told us many of these weavers, like the young woman below (photo by Wendy Bennett), are proud to be making saris for prominent retailers like Fab India. (Go to the FabIndia.com website and you can look at gorgeous saris made here in Chanderi and buy one if you're in the market.) If you look carefully at the photo, you'll see this young woman is seated at a "pit loom," with her lower legs and feet in a space that has been carved into the rough floor.

We visited a family home in Prampur that was two hundred years old and included two rooms on the first floor where different family members were working at two different looms. Their futon-like bedding and other furniture was pushed to the side or leaned against a wall for the work day.

The village was set up so that we could walk down the street and observe many different locals doing diverse tasks. One young woman was sitting on the ground in front of her home where she was positioning 5,000 purple threads on rods for someone else to weave. We also saw an old woman sitting on the ground hand-rolling a kind of cheap Indian cigarette called a "beedi." Our guide said that for every 1,000 beedis she makes, she earns about a dollar. The guide told me that because the weavers work many hours with fine threads, generally in poor light, their eyesight can suffer and some age out of their work by their 40s. That information really hit me hard: thinking about my own 72-year-old eyes and the tools and lighting I need at home. I always leave these trips stunned by how much artisans can do with basic materials and tools.

Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, there have been initiatives dating back at least 10 years to make the country a global manufacturing hub. His "Make In India" campaign of 2014 targeted 25 business sectors from biotech to textiles. New programs continue to provide looms and training because this has proven a good occupation for many, especially in rural areas. There are many forms of support for this, including a campus-like venue called Handloom Park we visited in Chanderi with multiple buildings to house weavers and looms working for multiple companies. We visited Tuntuni Brothers Handloom where they weave fabric and make saris, suits, kurtas (loosely-fitted tunics worn by men and women) and other items.

In the Tuntuni Brothers factory we watched weavers working at huge looms attached to what look like punch cards in an overhead rig, which determine the design. Cards like this have been used in weaving for several hundred years. See the photo below of the man at a loom? I took that at the Tuntuni factory (and I love his Demon Slayer t-shirt featuring a Japanese manga series.) Then we went into the factory showroom, where the man in the photo above laid out some of his company's most elaborate and precious saris like the one he's showing (which one of our group bought on the spot, to use as yardage.)

He explained that until about 60 years ago, his factory and others around India were using real gold and silver in the saris they made. No longer. These days, some of these older saris are taken to have the gold or silver removed because those materials are so valuable. He pulled out silk, cotton and silk/cotton blended saris and yardage to tempt us, strewn across the counter.

I also want to explain that this revival has been fiercely won, as industrial weaving facilities in China using Chinese silk really put a dent in the market for Indian handloomed saris about 15 years ago. At the hand loomed facilities we visited, all the silk comes from inside India, much of it from Bangalore, and much of that silk used in the finest saris is the width of a human hair. There is a lot of pride around the tradition and the results. While modern Indian women, especially in big cities, don't wear saris as often as they once did, they're still a wardrobe staple most places and definitely a must for big occasions.

Would you like to see these silks and weavers up close? Here is a terrific 5-minute video that talks about the history of Chanderi and what makes its saris special. To see a traditional Chanderi sari weaver at work in a one-minute video, go here.

Finally, I was fascinated to hear that some Bollywood lovers come to Chanderi because it was the backdrop for two popular movies in 2018. Here is the trailer to one of the movies, which is called "Sui Dhaga," which translates to Needle and Thread. The main characters start a tailoring business and you can see some clips of Chanderi weavers at work even in the trailer.

Obviously I'm a huge fan of India and of Marigold tours, which also provides excellent textile tours to such countries as Uzbekistan, Morocco and Viet Nam. There are other good textile tours out there, and I'll write more about them another time.

If you'd like to see more photos and commentary from my Textiles & Temples tour of India, check out my public Facebook page (going back to March 23) or Instagram, where I am @meg4quilts.



Gee's Bend Quilters' Workshops:

Multiple Opportunities Ahead

There are several regularly scheduled opportunities to take workshops with the Gee's Bend quilters of Alabama and I'll get to the specifics and links in a moment. But first, I wanted to tell you about a special exhibition and workshop happening in the northeast this summer.

The Spencertown Academy Arts Center in Spencertown, New York (about 130 miles northwest of NYC) is working with the Freedom Quilting Bee Legacy on an exhibition of more than 30 quilts titled "Gee's Bend: The Next Generation" from July 11 through August 3. In addition to the exhibition, there will talks, workshops and demonstrations. The arts center said that "this is the first time this generation of Gee's Bend quilters has traveled outside of their community in Alabama to present their works in such a major exhibition."

There will be six participating quilters: Loretta Pettway Bennett, Stella Mae Pettway, Emma Mooney Pettway, Polly Mooney Middleton, Sharon Ann Williams (pictured below),and Andrea Pettway Williams. They are third and fourth generation Gee's Bend women who learned to quilt from their mothers, grandmothers and great grandmothers. There will also be a special appearance by Willie Joe Pettway, son of legacy Gee's Bend quilter Lola Pettway, who will exhibit and discuss his late mother's quilts.

Reservations are not needed for the exhibition at the Art Center or for the quilting demonstrations on July 12 and July 13 or at a lecture on July 19 titled "Gee's Bend: The Legacy Lives On." The lecture will be given by Lisa Bouchard Hoe, curator of this show, who will discuss how Gee's Bend quilts "caused a major shift in thinking about what constitutes a quilt." She will also talk about how global fame has brought change to the small, remote Alabama community.

There will also be two quilting workshops at the Spencertown Art Academy in which participants will design and sew 12' square blocks suitable for framing. All materials will be provided. Those workshops will be July 13 and July 14. Reservations are required and this will fill quickly, as the maximum number of students per workshop is 10. Go here for registration.

In addition, popular quilting retreats with two notable Gee's Bend quilters, China Pettway and Mary Ann Pettway, continue several times a year at a venue near Jackson, Mississippi. I know people who have attended these retreats and had an amazing experience working alongside and getting inspired by these women. Currently posted on the retreat website are seven upcoming retreats including two in the Fall of 2025 (one has a waitlist), and four more in 2026. The retreats run from Wednesday through Saturday. Here is the page for registration.

Finally, there are workshops offered as part of the annual Airing of the Quilts that takes place in Gee's Bend, Alabama. This event has grown dramatically every year. The next one will be Saturday, October 4 and as the 5th annual Airing, there may be some extra elements to celebrate such as additional vendors and activities. Many who love the Gee's Bend quilters' style and story relish a chance to visit this place and buy quilts directly from the quilters, whose quilts are publicly displayed around town. There aren't a lot of details posted yet, but sign up for the newsletter and you'll get notice about workshop registrations and other details.

Quilt Index New Project Needs Patriotic + Community Quilts

I'm coming to you with some urgency about the nonprofit Quilt Index, a superb online archive of quilts that has documented 97,050 quilts so far. This is one of the premiere digital humanities projects in the country and it is part of Michigan State University's Matrix center. The quilt images and history have been carefully assembled with the help of state documentation projects, private collections, museums and historic homes.

The Index was founded just over 20 years ago, and it might never have launched without pivotal early financial support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. You may have read that under the current administration's DOGE, Department of Government Efficiency, there have been severe cutbacks to many government agencies and departments. Although the NEH abruptly canceled several previously awarded grants to the Quilt Index, a much bigger problem is that DOGE has essentially gutted the IMLS. Last year, that federal agency awarded $266 million in grants and research funding to museums and libraries across the land, and many of them are struggling to keep going.

Marsha MacDowell, a professor and curator at the MSU Museum who is also the director of the Index told me that "a good portion of the Quilt Index daily operations is partly funded by grants. If those are cut, we have to find alternative fundraising." If you are able to contribute any amount to the Index, I can tell you that they've got a promised match up to $25,000. You can go here to contribute.

But this setback isn't slowing down this nimble organization, which recently announced an exciting new project tied to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 2026, a little over a year from now. The Index's 250 Project is being launched this week and I want you to be in the loop since I believe lots of my readers will want to participate.

Americana Quilts 250! History Project: Patriotism and Celebration hopes to add more than 25,000 quilts to the Index that celebrate local and national history. "This is a huge milestone for our country, and you know people are going to make quilts, right?" Marsha said to me. There were thousands of quilts made for the Bicentennial, she notes, as well as all manner of quilts marking major anniversaries for communities and cities all over the U.S. The Index is seeking both quilts made for previous milestone years and quilts being made now for the 250th celebration.

Important Note: The Index isn't asking you to send your physical quilts to them in Michigan. What they need is clear, full photographs and detailed stories of quilts. To help people prepare for the submissions, they will be offering special virtual workshops in the fall "to assist individuals and organizations in preserving and adding their quilts to the Index." But you can get started now. What is required isn't just the typical information included on a quilt label, but the kind of expansive detail museum curators seek. You won't need to fill in every box, but you will have a form that gives you a lot more space for detail.

In addition, the Quilt Index team plans to work with scholars and artists to creative digital lesson plans, galleries and exhibitions for teaching and research. The thing that makes the Index magical is that quilts that will never physically hang side by side can still be studied together. Whether it's a scholar writing a book about patriotic quilts or a future quilter looking for inspiration for their current project, a quilt you made or collected can be included in the group of quilts they examine and study.

What kinds of quilts is the Index looking for? It's a long list, but this should help. The press release states, "We are especially interested in adding quilts honoring veterans and current military personnel, quilts featuring flags and other symbols of American patriotism, quilts that commemorate important events in U.S. history, community history quilts, U.S. Centennial quilts, the hundreds of quilts made as community history projects during the Bicentennial and the hundreds of new quilts that are already being made to celebrate America250 through a variety of initiatives. Literally we are anticipating thousands of quilts that can be documented and added to the Index."

Attention Quilt Guilds:

I believe this would be a terrific project for guilds to adopt. Maybe your guild even participated as a group in making one or more commemorative or patriotic quilts for a previous milestone, so you may already have the images and info required for submission. Maybe one person in the guild could share information like the submission procedure and guidelines and encourage individual makers to submit their quits. Or maybe the guild announces an individual or group challenge to make a quilt themed on the 250th founding anniversary and part of that project is helping submit those quilts to the Index.

As the launch continues, you will see details pop up on the home page of the Index at QuiltIndex.org. If you have specific inquiries you want to direct to Index staff, use this link, but understand they might need a little time to reply. You can get a sense of the submission process by looking at the forms here.

To be sure, there are already many patriotic and commemorative quilts documented within the Index, so your quilt will be in excellent company. Like the quilt below, made in the late 19th century by Birdella Miller. If you click the link here for the full record of this quilt in the Index, you'll get an idea of what sort of information they'll want about your quilt too. Also, although it is not related to this project, I added one of my own quilts to the Index as part of its Public Submissions protocol and you can check that out here. I'm here to tell you, it will take a little time and patience, but it's not that difficult to submit a quilt --and very satisfying.

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Quilt World News & Notes

Latest Quiltfolk Issue is Arkansas: Get 20% Off With This Code

I just got my copy of Issue 34 this weekend, and it's stunning. I wrote two profiles for this issue, including one of Linda Pumphrey, who was a major player in the quilt industry for years, and Belle Brunner, an up-and-coming designer and instructor you'll want to meet. You can get 20% off this single issue or a subscription by using the code MegQF34 at checkout. Go here to see a full list of profiles for the Arkansas issue and a fun 90-second highlights video.

Documentary About Prison Quilters Coming To Netflix Next Month

I've written several articles about "The Quilters" previously including an interview with the maker of this short documentary, Jenifer McShane. Jenifer shared footage with me at various stages and I've had an opportunity to watch the finished movie, which runs a little over 30 minutes. I recommend it highly. The Missouri prison's quilting program features men who make quilts for foster kids. They know a kid will get this quilt on his or her birthday and the quilters, some of whom experienced the foster system first-hand, try hard to make something special for the recipient of each quilt. Jenifer has made several excellent documentaries previously including one about mothers in prison ("Mothers of Bedford" in 2011) and another about two cops in Texas who serve as roving mental health experts ("Ernie & Joe: Crisis Cops" in 2019.) You can watch the trailer for "The Quilters" HERE. And here is a link to an interview Jenifer did when the film was on the festival circuit last summer. The documentary will be available on Netflix starting May 16.

Meg Cox

I'm good at talking too!

meg@megcox.com

Visit My Website to Learn About My Lectures Including The Newest one: "Talking to History."

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