Saturday, October 25, 2008

What's your favorite quilting magazine?

Without a doubt, mine is Fons and Porter's Love of Quilting. Every issue I find a quilt that I want to make. In the most recent issue, I found three! (Oak Leaf and Rose, Pinwheel Play and Christmas Sparkle - I'm definitely making the first one after the first of the year, and the others are going in my holding pile. I even know what fabric from my stash I'll use.).

McCall's Quilting, American Patchwork and Quilting, and Quiltmaker all have appealing patterns at times, and I often clip photos and designs for my inspiration notebooks. I read Quilter's Home for the articles, but Mark Lipinski's design aesthetic does not jibe with mine at all and I'm letting the subscription expire. None of them appeal to me like Fons and Porter. It's the only magazine than I devour when it arrives, muttering "Oh, that's great!" under my breath and dog-earing page corners.

Their designs are what I call "updated traditional". Their patterns are firmly rooted in traditional designs, with just enough modern use of color and layout to make them fresh and new. They seem to appreciate the history of the craft. I have nothing against abstract quilts, pictoral quilts, and all the other design innovations in the art, but they're not me.

Keep 'em coming, Fons and Porter. I'm waiting.

6 comments:

Paula, the quilter said...

QNM and American Quilter. I am letting Threads, Quilting Arts and Cloth-Paper-Scissors lapse.

Three Birds Inspired said...

BH&G American Patchwork is my favorite, followed by F&P Easy Quilts and then regular F&P. I look at Quilter's Newsletter at the library but rarely see anything that really "speaks" to me. I stopped getting ML Quilter's Home.

Joan J said...

I'm also a F&P girl and also subscribe to American Patchwork. DH bought me a subscription every year to Quilter's Newsletter, but it always made me feel like I wasn't artistic enough to quilt, so I dropped it. Quilter's Home - not enough about quilting and I don't need advice on my sex life -- If I don't have it right after 30 years, it ain't gonna happen ;)

Betty J in OKC said...

My fav quilting mags are: Quiltmaker and Quick Quilts and F&P. I do enjoy The Quilter and the BHG Quilt magazines sometimes. I'm getting to where I only buy magazines if I can find 3 patterns in there that I can't live w/o. LOL!

The Calico Cat said...

My answer...
http://thecalicocat.blogspot.com/2008/10/quilt-magazines.html

Linda said...

I have subscribed to every quilting magazine over the years. They just all seem to repeat themselves after a while. All they do is change the color scheme...I guess my favorite at the moment would be Fons and Porter followed by Quiltmaker....BH & G American Patchwork and Quiltmaker run hand in hand usually. I am receiving Quiltmaker at this time but letting it lapse. I have to purge my magazines alot. I usually give them to my guild for the guild store. I have gotten to where I look at them at the store and if I don't see at least two items of interest, I do not purchase them. The same now goes for books. I have worked in a quilt shop now for over 10 years and have a huge library of quilting books, knitting books, crochet and tatting books. Before I buy a book now, it really has to wow me. I give a lot of my books to the guild too. I don't have to make a quilt out of any book or magazine to enjoy them. I get alot of pleasure out of just looking at them. Unfortunately, I'm like you, I have run out of room and cannot or do not want to expand for my books...I love books though...hugs, Linda