A Taste of Africa

Yesterday I went to my  group meeting at Tuesday Quilters for a talk entitiled 'The Road to Patchwork' by Magie Relph. It was fascinating! Magie lived in Africa for a while and now has a small business selling fabrics produced there. She showed us some of her collection of different fabrics and explained how they are made. Many were wax prints which originally developed from Indonesian batiks - they are VERY colourful and have large patterns on them as they are used for clothing in Africa. Magie is a great speaker!

Of course I had to buy some fabric - it would have been rude not to! Here's my collection. I chose screen printed fabric,a half yard of discharge fabric and a trial pack of hand woven cottons, in a variety of weights, for dyeing. I also bought a piece of barkcloth which you can see in the background. It has a very interesting texture and I thought it would be good for my City and Guilds work. I don't know what I'll use it for yet!

Here is another photo of one of the printed cottons - don't you just love the little elephants?!

Pippa, a fellow member, told me the theme for next year's Harrogate quilt show is Africa so I'll have to start thinking how I could use these fabrics for a quilt to enter - any ideas?

Visit Magie's website and online shop by clicking here.