Sue Beevers - I am an artist and painter, but I started out as a spinner, weaver, and dyer, and my fibre work exists in collections throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan. I have also traveled extensively giving lectures and workshops at most of the major weaving and spinning fibre conferences. And I still have a weaving studio.

But I spend the majority of my life working with fabrics. I have written two books, both for C&T Publishing. My first, Off the Shelf Fabric Painting is available online at C&T's website. My new book is Dancing Dragonfly Quilts, and is available at your local quilt store. If it isn't, ask them, and I'm sure that they'll be happy to get it for you.

I've been a guest artist twice on HGTV's Simply Quilts, and I have designed 4 fabric lines and numerous quilt kits for RJR Fabrics. I now design fabrics for Robert Kaufman.

I'm also a 'cellist. I have a private 'cello studio, and I teach 'cello at Hamilton College. So, I live in two different worlds: music and art. Good thing I'm a workaholic!

I live in rural central New York State, and much of my work is about the inextricable link between people and the natural world, and the sheer joy of existing in such a fascinating environment.

Eldrid Røyset Førde lives on a small, remote island on the west coast of Norway. She has been involved in textile related activities some way or other almost all her life, and became interested in patchwork and quilting in the late eighties. Being a school teacher by profession, it was no big step to start teaching patchwork classes locally soon after, and she has since been teaching and lecturing throughout Scandinavia.

In 1999 she entered the international scene with her prize winning Kameleon Quilts™, which she was also invited to show on HGTV's Simply Quilts in episode # 1116.

In addition to her fascination with three dimensional and folding techniques, she has also been experimenting with photos in textiles, using the knowledge she has gained in this area in several small and larger commissions.

Through her business Kameleon Tekstildesign she has self published a few patterns, including the patterns for the Kameleon Quilts™.

You can see all her patterns and more of her work at her website.

Chris Hammacott - My whole life seems to have been enriched by textiles, I trained as and worked for many years as a weaver and I taught spinning and natural dyeing long before they gained their green credentials. The love of cloth led me to embroidery and in particular stumpwork, the 17th century raised embroidery that offers so much potential for humour and detail.

When at last I found patchwork it was like coming home, I could make something useful (like weaving) but also decorative (like embroidery) it also gave my magpie tendencies full rein as I could collect old quilts, which I use as design sources and inspiration. Designing for magazines seemed to be a natural step, making slightly different projects is great fun, and I hope readers like my designs, and even better feel able to adapt and make them there own. My designs feature regularly in Popular Patchwork and Patchwork and Quilting magazines.

I love to teach, both through my own distance learning City & Guilds Centre where I teach up to Diploma level and also beginner's classes, Guild and Group workshops and master classes. In teaching I feel that I can set a student off on a journey, it is wonderful to see a beginner master a technique or a block or a more experienced patchworker see another way of approaching a technique. I try not to take myself too seriously and my workshop here in West Wales is a riot of fabrics, threads, strong tea, Bruce Springsteen and Pearl my Pug.........

2010 looks to be a busy year, with more on line classes and a series of sampler quilts being taught from my web site.

You can visit her web site at WS Touchbase

Bonnie Heap - I am an artist that loves to do many types of crafts. I started sewing, when I was 8 years old, from my grandmother. When I was in high school I had a small sewing job where I made things for other people. Some of these included patchwork drapes and flower girl dresses.

Later I began working with my mother-in-law in a factory where we made hand made items we shipped all over the world. While I was there, for over 20 years, we used computer art to modify and create pictures in Photoshop and Print Shop to make our brochures and web pages.

Several years ago I got back into sewing and started working on quilts again and started with a quilt for our bed that led to making an art quilt, from photos, of our trip Colorado. I used EQ6 to design these quilts and have been using it ever since.

I have been teaching others to for many years and love to see the joy my students have when they can create things they never thought they could. I am an authorized teacher for the Electric Quilt Company to teach EQ6 & EQ7 to others and help show them how to get the most out of the program. I love to show others the fun in learning how to do what they think is impossible into something to show off and be proud of. Let's have fun designing and sewing together.

Maria Hrabovsky likes to say that she has been involved in sewing and needlework since the age of two because that's when she first asked for a needle and thread so she could "sew." She started actual sewing lessons in grade 7 after which she began sewing clothing for herself and, in later years, for her family.

Her fascination with quilts started in first grade when her teacher read stories about pioneers and their quilts. To this day, scrap quilts are her favourites. She started quilting in 1985. In 2001 she realized that a great deal of her husband's art work would make great quilt patterns and began designing and selling patterns based on them. Afterwards, she began designing and including her own patterns as well.

Maria, Michael, and their quilts have appeared in Quiltmaker, The Canadian Quilter and Miniature Quilt Ideas. They were interviewed for a series on Couples in the Quilt Business for The Professional Quilter and Maria later wrote a two part article for the magazine. Maria's quilts have been shown at three International Quilt Markets. She was among the quilters who were invited to submit a quilt to a juried show, "Kindred Spaces" in honour of the celebration of 100 Years of Anne of Green Gables in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada. Her quilt was accepted and won third place. She is a former elementary school teacher who now enjoys teaching quilting.

Maria has recently become the editor of the new, exciting, online only, "The Quilt Pattern Magazine".

You can visit her web site at Maria Michaels Designs.
You can find some of her quilts at Quilts for Sale.
You can learn more about the magazine at The Quilt Pattern Magazine.

Since 1970, artist Vicki L. Johnson has been creating quilted and painted artworks. Her work uses landscapes and seascapes for inspiration.

Vicki is a graduate of the University of Michigan with a degree in graphic design. She worked in that field for ten years before devoting her time to quilts. She has taught classes in traditional and contemporary quilting, fabric painting, dyeing and soft sculpture for quilt stores, guilds and the College of the Redwoods. Currently, she is a freelance teacher lecturing and teaching for Guilds and quilt conferences. She is the author of Paint and Patches published by the American Quilter's Society.

Vicki has won many awards with her quilts including a first place at the American Quilter's Society show in 1995 and 1988, a second place in 1994 and several honorable mentions. At the Pacific International Quilt Festival, she won the Best Interpretation of Theme in 1994 and Best Pictorial in 2001. At the International Quilt Festival, her quilt won Best Innovative in 1991, first place Art in 1993, and third place Pictorial 2001.

The painted quilts of Vicki L. Johnson have been seen in international exhibitions and collections, private and corporate. They are owned by the Oregon Coast Aquarium, the Museum of the American Quilter's Society, Valley Oak Dental Group, Fairfield Processing Corp., Mountain Bell and private collectors in America, Canada, England, Sweden and Switzerland.

To see more of Vicki's work, visit her web site.

For almost 30 years (hooboy, doesn't that push the time machine button), Eleanor Levie has worked as a needlework and crafts editor, author, and book producer, with quilting as a specialty. Her most recent book is Skinny Quilts & Table Runners, from That Patchwork Place/ Martingale. She produced eight volumes of the Rodale's Successful Quilting Library series, authored Great Little Quilts, co-authored Country Living Country Quilts, and was the editor of Fast, Fun & Easy Fabric Bowls, among many other books and magazines. With American Quiltmaking: 1970-2000, she added quilt historian to her portfolio.

Elly is a quilter herself, with a special passion for inspiring new and experienced quilters. She loves to see them incorporate crafts and innovative techniques into their work and to appreciate quilts as art and as craft. Elly presents slide lectures, often on quilt history and art quilts, to guilds and groups. Her workshops broaden the opportunities for exciting creative expression in surface design and embellishment.

Home is Bucks County, PA. Learn more at her web site.

Therese May began making quilts in 1965 and is widely recognized as one of the leaders in the field of Art Quilts. She has exhibited throughout the United States, Europe and Japan. She travels, giving lectures and workshops, encouraging students to get in touch with their own creativity. She has appeared on the HGTV television show Simply Quilts and has taught at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts; the Cleveland Institute of Art as well as for many other venues. Therese has written articles for Quilters Newsletter Magazine as well as American Quilter Magazine. She is known for her energetic and innovative pictorial art quilts and is very prolific in this medium.

"Each and every one of us is creative. Each child is born with creativity. This is part of who we are. Each person is unique and capable of expressing something which reflects his/her own individual quality. There is a Creative Spiritual Energy which flows through us all, and which connects us all together. I believe that we can use this energy to create whatever we want to experience in life."

To see more of Therese's work, visit her web site.

Mary Marcotte is a quilter who has been sewing most of her life. A mother of three boys, she designed and sewed for her children as they were growing up. Now a grandmother of several girls, she loves to design and sew the little dresses and girly clothing that she missed earlier.

An avid quilter, Mary loves the entire process from designing to binding. She has been a high school teacher and college instructor for over 20 years, which gives her the advantage of understanding the many learning styles of students. She is especially adept at rewording or rewriting process notes to give students optional ways of learning.

Mary lives in the deep South where she enjoys teaching English, library sciences, and quilting. Her quilting classes are fun, interpretative, hands-on experiences that keep students laughing, quilting, and begging for more.

To learn more about Mary, visit her blog.

A native Californian, Scarlett Rose learned to quilt in 1976 and began teaching in 1986. Scarlett has taught for quilt guilds, shops and conferences throughout the United States and has taught twice in Japan. She is the author of two books, Celtic Style Floral Applique and Baskets: Celtic Style, both published by AQS, and has a line of quilt patterns published by Seams To Be.

Celtic applique is Scarlett's specialty, partly because of her heritage (She's half Scottish/Irish and half Japanese) and also because of her lifelong fascination with all kinds of knotwork. She knows a wide variety of techniques for doing Celtic applique, and does teach applique by hand or machine. Her Celtic designs reflect her exploration of the art form, from traditional Celtic knotwork to her own unique blend of Asian and Celtic.

You can learn more about Scarlett at her website.

Nadine Ruggles has been sewing and crafting since childhood, and was caught by the quilting bug in 1990. She wanted to make "just one (large) quilt" for the bed, and, of course, couldn't stop quilting after that. Being mostly self-taught, Nadine sees each new quilt as a challenge, and she applies her special talents for fabric selection, precision piecing, elegant quilting and unexpected embellishments to traditional blocks to create innovative quilt art pieces.

She enjoys choosing fabrics, finding the perfect fabric for a certain block or pattern, and putting different colors and fabrics together to create new effects. Her work is a collection of many styles, some quilts are decidedly traditional, while others are more innovative or in the art quilt genre. Quilts and projects with many different fabrics are the most interesting and challenging to her.

Nadine lives in Angelbachtal, Germany, where she teachesclasses and workshops in a variety of quilting and embellishment techniques. Her quilts have been exhibited across the United States in quilt shows, galleries and museums, and her newest work and techniques will be published by the American Quilter's Society in July, 2009.

You can visit her web site at www.dreamweavers-quilts.com.

Although Cinzia White made her first quilt in 1984, a gift for her future husband Paul, she had no idea at that stage of all of the finer details that were needed to make a 'proper' quilt. That quilt was made using the 'try this it should work' technique and although it was a much loved gift she has since learnt and taught many skills which she utilizes in her ever increasing collection of quilts.

In 1987 she completed her first quilt class, a hand made sampler, and from this has progressed and created several award winning quilts.

Cinzia has had numerous patterns published in Down Under Quilts, Patchwork and Quilting (Australia) and Patchwork and Stitching and regularly teaches classes in her local area and throughout Australia.

Although favoring complicated hand pieced and hand quilted designs Cinzia has also designed numerous popular machine pieced quick quilts. Her love of scrap, or dislike of too much uniformity in fabric, has lead to a range of so called Scrooge Quilts, which utilizes the leftovers from her larger quilts.

To find out more about Cinzia, just visit her blog.

I'm Karen Whiteside, aka the Passionate Quilter, and have a love of quilting that dates back to 1988. I hand quilted for 3 years on donated tops, then had to learn to make my own tops. I gleaned all I could from books and wishing there were classes to shorten the learning curve!

Maybe that is why I love teaching beginners. I can help shorten that learning curve. Mostly I love seeing the light bulbs go off and seeing how happy they are when they realize they can make something beautiful.

I teach at a JoAnn ETC store and local quilt shops. In 2004, I opened my own Studio, where I hold classes, retreats and PJ Parties! I'm always trying to learn the newest quilting techniques to share with others.

I've had a few quilts hang in Houston in special exhibits, including the 9-11 exhibit in 2000. That quilt is in the America: From the Heart book by Karey Bresnehan. It was also selected to go on the world tour until 2004.

I'm just an ordinary gal with an extraordinary passion for quilting!

To find out more about Karen, just visit her website. You can also visit her blog.