I spent last week in Chicago for the h+h Americas trade show. It's like Quilt Market, but it's not exclusively for quilting businesses. There were yarn companies, garment pattern designers, embroidery kit makers, and more. There were also A LOT of quilting companies - fabric companies, pattern designers, scissors makers, sewing machine brands, notions companies, and on and on. There were gorgeous quilts everywhere and so many people I recognized from online.
I arrived in Chicago Monday morning and Laura of Slice of Pi Quilts arrived that afternoon. We've been friends online for almost 10 years, but when she arrived at the hotel to pick me up for supper that was the first time we'd ever met in person. It was so good to finally get to spend time together without a screen between us! Here we are in front of her booth.
Tuesday was set-up day for everyone with booths. I chose not to have a booth for my first time attending, so that was h+h University day for me. There were classes and small group sessions and a tour of the show floor (which was still a work in progress, with booths being put together). When I got my badge that morning, it was a bit surreal to look around at the other people in the room and see so many faces I recognized from social media.
Wednesday-Friday was the actual show and I loved wandering and looking at all the booths. So many beautiful quilts, gorgeous yarn, threads of all kinds, and kits for so many fun things. I don't crochet, but had to take a picture of this kit for making Tairn and Andarna from Fourth Wing. I've always loved dragons and I love Fourth Wing, so this is almost enough to make me want to start crocheting!
Even with the dragons and the amazing quilts, the people were my favourite part of the week. I didn't think to take pictures with everyone I met, but I did remember to get some. Here's Laura in her booth.
And Terri of Lizard Creek Quilting, who was right next to Laura.
I got to meet Brandy from the Quilter on Fire podcast. Did you listen to my conversation with her on the podcast?
Hilary of By Hilary Jordan was just as lovely as I thought she would be! She was also dressed in beautiful handmade clothes every day!
I did demos in the Oliso booth on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons, sharing about colouring quilts with crayons. I had my brand new In Full Bloom quilt with me, along with my Grateful table runner, so I could show shop owners examples of quilts coloured with crayons. The technique has been around for a long time, but a lot of the people I talked with had never heard of it, so it was fun to share with them. If you've never tried it, either, I have a tutorial for it here - it's a lot of fun and really easy to do!
I spent time late in the day Thursday and on Friday taking special notice (and notes and pictures) of how different quilt pattern designers had put their booths together. How were they hanging quilts on the walls? How were they displaying quilts not on the walls? What else did they have in the booth? I'm dreaming and scheming for how I can display my own quilts in a booth someday (next year?). Since I have to fly to get to the show, I paid special attention to display ideas that could be packed in a suitcase, like this stand in the Sassafrass Lane booth that was made of PVC pipe and could be disassembled for transport.
I also loved how Kori of Olive and Grace Studios used embroidery hoops to hang some of her quilts.
After years of dreaming about going to Quilt Market, it was so fun to finally make the dream come true (slightly altered to be h+h Americas instead). Now to see if I can make it work to go again next year and maybe have a booth of my own!