 This is Dennis McMahon and welcome to Positively Vermont. And today we are going to be exploring one of the most interesting and historic events in Vermont, the Vermont Quilt Festival, which is celebrating, I believe, its 45th anniversary. And we have a panel of guests who are going to tell us everything you need to know about quilting, about the history of quilts, and how to get involved with the Vermont Quilt Festival. And we have Caitlin Delano, who is the show coordinator. We have Carrie Zizza, who is the contest chair. And we have Laura Clements, who is the exhibits chair, and each a very big responsibility. So what I'd like to ask first is each one of you I'll start on the screen with Carrie. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got involved with quilts and the Quilt Festival. Carrie, you want to tell us a little bit about yourself. I've been quilting for about 22 years, and I always, every year I would go to the Vermont Quilt Festival because it was just the atmosphere and the flavor of the show was just so welcoming and so accessible. And as I continue my quilting journey, the board positions opened up and I had been the contest chair basically at my local Quilt Guild. And the contest chair for the Vermont Quilt Festival became available. I was like, I love that show, want to be involved, and I applied for the position and I got it and I was very happy about that. And it's been wonderful. This is my, last year was my first year, but the show is canceled. And so this is actually my second year on the board but my first actual show. And it's just been so much fun working with the board and the public and the, and the contestants. It's just, it's been wonderful. Right. Laura, tell us a little bit about yourself. I've been quilting for a little over 40 years, my mom taught me. And 16 years ago I moved to Vermont, went to my first Vermont Quilt Festival. I thought I had done God to Heaven this fantastic event with all these world-class teachers right here in Vermont was only half an hour away from me. So for me, Vermont Quilt Festival week every year feels like it should be a national holiday. And so I'm involved with some of the local quilting guilds. And so when I heard about the position of exhibits coordinator being open, I checked in with some friends and a good friend was actually the previous coordinator. So I thought it might be a great fit for me and like Carrie applied for the position and was given a chance to work with this fantastic group. Great. Well, Caitlin, you're the show coordinator. Tell us a little bit about yourself and the Vermont Quilt Festival. I have been with VQF for, this would be my third show. Yes, our third festival together. And I am also a quilter and all doing all do all the crafts. And I have been, it's been a fantastic to be involved with VQF. Not only is it so rewarding and inspiring to see all the quilters and all of their work, but you get to you get to meet so many wonderful people and yeah it's just a fantastic time VQF is a super special place, and I'm so lucky to be involved. That's great. Tell us what what a quilt is. I know you have varieties. We, when we did this in studio we had people, two or three people just carrying big roles in, and we had other people with little tiny kinds of quilts tell us what a quilt is, and how did it become an art form and for some a hobby and for others, a business. So anyone could chime in on these questions. The quilting industry in the United States right now is over $3 billion. And there are, there are quilters who for this is just a hobby and there are quilters for who this is a business. They're either teaching, lecturing or entering competitions with their quilts. And what a quilt is, is it consists of three layers the top, the batting and the backing and putting together and sewing together the top is called piecing, and actually stitching the three layers together is called quilting. And if it doesn't have three layers, the layers aren't all stitched together it isn't a quilt. And what, what types of uses that it have in addition to providing warmth though, what was it used for? When did it become an art form in and of itself? Okay, I'll go. Quilting has been around since the beginning of time, since, you know, man was able to stitch things together using sinew, bone needles, these kinds of things. But it, in the 1970s in the bicentennial era in 1976 quilting made a huge comeback. And since then it's just really taken off. What started as people assembling the three layers for just utilitarian needs to keep warm or to, there was actually a quilt that was used as armor and for warriors. And so, as, as the, as, you know, since the 1970s, it has just developed into many, many different kinds of forms like there are art quilts that are just designed to be art pieces of art. There are of course still bed quilts. There's quilts that are designed and made to be hung on the wall as decoration. There are all different kinds of types of quilts, like for example, in the Vermont Quilt Festival, we have several different categories of quilts and for some of those, one of the categories is pictorial. Whatever image on the quilt is easily recognizable as a person, place or thing that goes into the pictorial category and we have the miniature category where it's actually very interesting to me. It's the miniature category is the quilt could be no larger than 24 inches on one side or 90 inches perimeter. And if you look at it in a photograph, you would not be able to tell how big the quilt actually was. So some of these bed quilts get scaled way down into these tiny little quilts. So that is one of, for me that is one of the most exciting and interesting categories in the show is the miniatures. And there's the size quilt that are basically just categorized according to size, and they can be used for anything, you know, throw on the couch on a quilt on your bed. So whatever the uses of quilts is just limited by a person's imagination. I think I remember the postage stance they did that by Centennial with, with quilts and that kind of dates me but one of the things that I was impressed about when we did shows about the festival in the past is the diversity of people involved. It is not just a female occupation, or advocation, or it's not just something limited to the industrial giants of quilts and, and manufacturing and all kinds of race pre color sexual orientation. It's a very, and also, not particularly an American thing I know we've had guests from England on the show to talk about quilts. So maybe someone would like to contemplate on what this year's show is going to be in terms of diversity and participation I think Caitlin is ready to answer that. We are so excited this this year. I mean it's, it's been as Kerry mentioned earlier earlier last year's festival as canceled due to pandemic and so we're very excited to still be able to join and meet and have the US this year. And we're doing it all virtually and that provides so much more opportunity for people anywhere around the world to join. And so we've had, we have some amazing instructors and participants and people taking classes from India to Alaska. It's been really exciting and we've got some fantastic instructors teaching all sorts of different concepts and quilting backgrounds. So, yeah, we're really excited and we also have a fantastic youth category to so we try to encourage all people to come and quilt with us and just have fun. What's great I notice this is going to be running 10 days, June 17 to June 27 online. I think it used to be at the Champlain Valley exposition in the old days but this is going to be pretty worldwide for 10 days. And I just like to find out from you all what what events are being planned I, I have a whole list here but why don't we start out with the virtual quilt contest tell us what that's about. So, the virtual quilt contest was pretty. It was just very interesting to try and put that together this year because I had never done anything like that before. So, what happens is people in a virtual quilt contest, people submit their photographs of their quilts by photographs five shots that were required. Those are passed on to our judges, we have two judges this year we usually have four and they judge the quilts by the photographs, and they were able to zoom in and get up, you know real close to examine the different parts of the quilts that they wanted to see. And so each contestant gets a score sheet from each of the judges with comments and a numerical value of their score. And this is what is, I think, unique. And for me, the most special thing about the remarkable festival is each quilt is judged on its own merits. And in most other quilts, each category is judged and then there's a first place, a second place and a third place winner. And in the Vermont Quilts Festival, it each, each quilt gets a ribbon if the score merits it. And then we have our special categories like best of show, best machine quilting, each judge gets to pick their favorite quilts and give that a ribbon. And we do have a very, very special youth category that they usually get a special gift of some sort of just for entering. And it was, there was a lot of technicality involved, but it all came together and Caitlin is the circulatory system of Vermont Quilts Festival and she I think works in pretty long, pretty hard hours to get this all going and is still working long and hard hours. And that's basically the contest in that show. And also someone could summarize what else is going to be going on well I understand we had exhibits vendors classes and lectures. Could someone summarize that we're having a little bit of a time pressure here right now. But if you could just summarize what else is going to be happening. What else is going to be going on with vendors classes and lectures. Yeah, I'll jump in we have five special exhibits this year. It wouldn't be a Vermont Quilt Festival without antique quilts and that's one area of our special exhibits and events. We have a beautiful collection of very modern quilts from the modern quilt guilt, and we have a fiber art exhibit as Carrie mentioned a lot of quilts are really intended to be art in our category. And so we have a beautiful exhibit called visionary art quilts. It's a special exhibit of quilts from our 45 year history of contest quilts, and they all feature the color blue because it's our sapphire anniversary. So lots to see this year with special exhibits all from the comfort of your own home. I remember in previous episodes of the show we, we were shown a quilt that's going to be raffled off tell us about what's going to happen with the raffle. Caitlin I see you're ready to answer. Yes, yes, so every year we have a raffle quilts made by someone in the community and we are thrilled to have that again this year virtually. We have a beautiful quilts that has a great blue theme for our sapphire year that will be raffled off and tickets can be purchased attendees can purchase tickets at the virtual show, and the winner will be announced on Sunday the 27th. How can people participate in this. How do they connect with the show. So you can visit vqf.org as in Vermont Quilt Festival vqf.org and you can purchase a $5 show pass and that will get you access virtual access to all of the exhibits vendor demos gallery talks with exhibitors. You can see all the contest quilts, a lot of really fun events going on and again access to that all the raffles and. And then we also do have other lectures and classes that are still accepting registration so if anybody sees anything exciting there we sign ups happen until the day of the event so. That's great I understand it's going to be stream live on your Facebook page that effect. Yes, the award ceremony will be streamed live through Facebook on Wednesday, June 16. So that's going to be the night before it's going to kick off June 16 and tell us about that virtual award ceremony how is that going to work. Now, basically, I carry is going to be coordinating a fantastic show with the judges, and also contestant winners so it's the first time to be revealed the contest quilt winners, it's always a lot of fun and very exciting for everybody to see that for the first time. What's the follow up from that well that that quote the winner will be used during the coming year for any events or specialty operations by by the Vermont Quilt Festival, or will be on your literature or something like that. What is what is the distinction that goes with being the winner. Yes, yes, well I'll carry can talk about the awards but there's a very prestigious best of show award. All of the ribbon winners will be displayed in person at the next festival in 2022 when we are in person, but carry can talk more about those exciting awards. We have several and the, like the most prestigious is the best of show, which would be what the judges considered to be the best quilt in the show. The next most prestigious is the Vermont. I think they call it the governance award. But it is basically an award given to the best quote from Vermont. And we have several other machine quilting ribbon. Best best pictorial best miniature. And the judges also are able to customize the awards to put that they feel like deserve special recognition but don't fit into any of the actual categories. Well, how many people do have participate when it was live. And you can see around anywhere from four to 10,000 attend each year. So we are looking forward to to seeing people again virtually this year in a different capacity but we're going to be a lot of fun and still being able to explore and enjoy quilting together. And you have a website, which is www.vqf.org. And you also have a Facebook page for further information. Well this has been wonderful. I want to thank you for appearing on positively Vermont my guests have been Caitlyn Delano the show coordinator, carry is is a the contest chair and Laura Clements the exhibit chair for the Vermont Festival, which will be starting on June 16. This is Dennis McMahon. And thank you for watching.