ID Number: TQ.2015.043
Name of interviewee: Jean Wilkinson
Name of interviewer: Jacquie Barwell
Name of transcriber: Jacquie Barwell
Location: Jean’s home
Address: East Grinstead, West Sussex
Date: 28 August 2015
Length of interview: 0:19:12
Summary
Jean talks about her ‘Clematis Stars’ quilt that she made for herself. She adapted a design she found in a new quilt book, used batik fabrics and incorporated some of her favourite technique – applique. Jean also talks about her introduction to quilting through a class, as well as the early origins of the Greenstede Quilt group and Hever Quilt show.
Interview
Jacquie Barwell [JB]: Well, Jean, thank you very much for agreeing to be interviewed for the Talking Quilts project. I’ve known you a long time and I’ve seen a lot of your quilts, but I would like to really hear a little bit more about this particular quilt that you’ve chosen for the interview.
Jean Wilkinson [JW]: Well. I have made lots of quilts over the years as you know and most of them have been for friends, grandchildren and great grandchildren and stuff like that. And I thought it’s about time I had one of my own. So I was collecting, cos I use a lot of batiks as you know, and I’ve been collecting quite a lot over the years and I’d got a beautiful collection together but I didn’t know how to use them. I needed some inspiration. So, at one of the quilt shows, probably Sandown, I found another book by Judy Martin, who, I’ve got quite a lot of her books because she’s quite inspirational. And I found this beautiful book [shows book] quilt in there and it had areas in it that needed, I felt, to be filled up with something. As you know, I love doing applique, so I thought that was ideal. And that’s how I started with this particular quilt.
JB: So, can you tell us about the main blocks and the colours that you chose.
JW: Well, the main blocks as you can see are all stars, different sizes of stars, and obviously I needed to, in the middle of them to have some quite bright ones and then the star shapes going with the colours going round it. I’m fairly good with colour, I think, my daughters say I am. And so I can actually I think, with my eye, pick out what I wanted to do. I lay them out. I had to have three main areas getting slightly darker towards the edge, for me, blocks that were empty. So the middle of it I chose this bright fabric that it would look like sunshine, I felt. And then the next one had to be green and I, it’s got green with leaves on it. And then outside is a much darker green, as you can see from, I wanted to progress outwards. And that’s what I did.
JB: And I see you’ve filled a lot of the empty spaces with applique.
JW: Yes.
JB: Can you tell us about your methods of applique.
JW: Well, I, what I did first, I laid out. Freezer paper is very good for laying and drawing on roughly. So I laid the freezer paper on the area that I needed and then brought back to the table the table and filled, did sort of the stalk part of the flowers. I thought with the colours that I’d got actually clematis would be ideal. That’s how I came upon using that, because I’ve got so many different colours. Then I drew that and went out and did the drawings, did them roughly, and then I, what I do, I then put another piece of freezer paper down where I’ve copied the line of the stalks so I can mark the line of the stalks where I want them on the quilt, just with a line of drawing with a thin pencil down where the lines were going to go. And then I use a method using Vilene where I draw on both sides of the Vilene rather like doing, what do you call that quilting? Where you do it on the reverse? It’s all back to front, quilting… foundation!
JB: Oh, yes.
JW: And that always… I’m getting old now so it, it goes. Foundation. So you actually start by putting the… using the back where you’ve drawn it through to the back, you lay your fabrics on the front of it, then turn them over with little running stitches round. I learnt this all from Patricia McLaughlin because I went to two of her sessions and I thought it was absolutely wonderful. Because when you’ve made the flowers and you can actually embroider them all and everything. And then put them on your background and then of course you’ve got the little bit of Vilene at the edge of it so you then hand applique that to your background and it makes the flowers all stand up. So actually, and then when you come to quilting part of it of course, you quilt round them with invisible thread and it makes them all stand out and never go flat. You’ve got your flowers sitting on the surface forever, which is very, very effective.
JB: It’s lovely. So, having put the quilt together, done the applique we come onto the quilting itself which is an essential part of the quilt of course.
JW: I never know how I’m going to do it when I start. It’s something that grows as I’m doing it. So I started off putting… using the patterns that you can buy, plastic patterns, stencils and did those on the biggest stars first and then found that a smaller one that I could do round the little stars. And then I thought ‘well what are we going to do now’ so I laid down. I use Golden Hands, or sometimes it’s called Golden Hands or sometimes Golden Threads it depends on who produces it. It’s a wonderful thing. It’s a rather like the old Izal toilet paper [laughs] we always used to use. But I use the 18 inch one, a nice wide one. I put that on the top of it and I cut it to size and then I very gently with a pencil on the top to roughly where I think I would like to do other bits of leaves and things all out of it. And I draw my own patterns then. I bring that back to the table and I use one of the Pigma pens, you know, the ind…? Invisible, not the invisible… what’s the word I’m looking for?
JB: Disappearing?
JW: No I don’t. It hasn’t got to disappear, you’ve got to use it. Um…. [JB: Never mind] never mind, anyway. It doesn’t matter. One of those pens so that when I draw through it because pencil, you’ve got to be very careful, because you can’t let the pencil get through. It discolours if you put it on pale fabric, it doesn’t matter on darker and it doesn’t show up anyway when you’re working on darker. So I use black pen and I do it and then I pin it all in place with lots of pins and then I machine, with the free machine, with the feed dog down and I go all round the leaves and the… whatever I’m doing. And then the rest of it I’ve used quite a bit of other kind of stencils in different areas where I’ve also used the Golden Hands paper to do that whenever I’m doing anything. Over blocks, I use that.
JB: It’s so fine.
JW: It’s fine. And it tears away very, very easily, no problem at all. If you get a little bit which sticks in the place all you’ve got to do is get a pin, it comes out beautifully. I use it all the time.
JB: And I think it works very effectively, doesn’t it. It’s so easy to place things where you want and you’re not drawing onto the quilt itself. [JW: No, no] You mentioned Patricia McLaughlin, and she, I understand she’s a local quiltmaker to West Sussex,
JW: Yes
JB: and teacher.
JW: [Section of text removed for data protection]. But, she really inspired me. I went to two workshops and she showed me how to do this invisible, what you call it… applique on Vilene and I thought this was absolutely wonderful. All her work was so lovely. As you know she’s well known. She, her first thing I saw was her beautiful quilt of Chichester, and that was fabulous and then she went on make that wonderful African quilt for her husband, yes, which was all… um, yeah, it was absolutely beautiful her work
JB: How did you first get involved in quilt making?
JW: Well, I started, like everybody does, weirdest thing of all. Why do we all do it? But we do. Hexagons. Somebody was closing up her shop and she gave me all her books where she’d, you know sample books and they were all curtain fabric. I didn’t know the difference in those days.
JB: When was that?
JW: At least 70… 74/5 probably. Years ago. I lived over in Weybridge then. But then I came over because my daughter came to Bush Davies School in East Grinstead. She passed. So we came and transferred here in 1976. And I’d also been doing a lot of embroidery. I’d been going to embroidery classes. And I, sort of, put the two things together. And that, when I came here, I thought well I didn’t know anybody, the best thing for me to do was go and join the ladies at the embroidery classes, which I did. And that’s where I met a lot of people who are now members of the group that we are in, Greenstede Quilters. And, one day somebody came in and said ‘we’re starting up a group, they’d like us, The Quilters’ Guild would like us to start a group in the area. Is anybody interested?’ So, several of us joined up. So in 1982, we became the Greenstede Quilters and there are three of us still left of the originals and I’m one of them.
JB: And I believe there’s a history of the name, why Greenstede was chosen.
JW: Yes, Greenstede apparently, means a clearing in the forest and of course that’s how East Grinstead is. It’s a clearing in the Ashdown Forest. And of course all the trees disappeared because they were doing all the iron works around here. Everywhere ironworks.
JB: Now I think it’s lovely to have that historical connection.
JW: Yes.
JB: Through the name of the group.
JW: That’s what we did at the time.
JB: And did you go to any classes in those early days?
JW: What for patchwork. Well, I’m very much, self-taught. Very self-taught. I thought I’d buy books and things. As I said before, I’ve never had to worry too much about colour. It seems to be something that I’ve got automatically. My two daughters are very good artists as well so that probably runs in the family. And I did a lot myself. But we, we’ve, in the group, we’ve been very much helping each other. But then I went to, I thought, right embroidery. One of the classes came up at the local school’s an Adult Education, to do an A-level? An O-level in embroidery. And there were eight of us went there and one of these ladies talked to me one day, I got quite friendly with her, and the teacher, Molly Perry, who’d been our embroidery teacher all those years was taking this class and she said one week ‘right, we’re going to have a little change next week. Bring in pieces of cotton fabric’ she said we’re going to have a little patchwork.’ So the next week we arrived. We had a little room. She showed us how to cut it all out and everything. And, this lady I’d made friends with, Jennie Lewis, said to me ‘Ooh, I like this’. I could see this she says. And I said to her ‘Well, why don’t you come along and join us’ And that, of course, is the beginning of the history of quilting in our area anyway. Because probably a lot of people would know Jennie Lewis anyway because she became, you know, she’s taught and everything.
JB: And she’s a life member of The Quilters’ Guild.
JW: A life member of The Quilters’ Guild because she started the Hever Quilt Show.
JB: And, what is the Hever Quilt Show?
JW: Well, the Hever quilt show is held about the second weekend in September and it’s been going now for about 22 or 23 years. Jennie did it for ten years, oh, golly its probably gone even longer than that. And she ran it for ten years and it became quite an established thing round this area. People were coming from all over the place in coaches and things to see. A marquee on the lawn at Hever.
JB: Hever Castle.
JW: Yes, yes. And it’s still going. Two weeks time. Yes.
JB: Yes. And run by Region 2 of the Quilters’ Guild.
JW: Region 2 of The Quilters’ Guild. And I’ve been lucky enough to win first prize twice, second prize once and third prize twice I think.
JB: And the voting for the prize is by general public.
JW: General public. Yes, anybody voting. It’s a viewers’ choice.
JB: And I think that’s a lovely thing to win.
JW: Yes, so do. Really chuffed.
JB: A real accolade. Well done Jean.
JW: Yes, it gave me real encouragement to carry on, I was thinking, well, I am doing things right.
JB: I’m sure you’re doing things right. And who do you mostly make quilts for?
JW: Well, as I said, members of the family really. And I just and I get inspired. I can’t ever be without sewing. It doesn’t matter who I’m making it for. I just make it. My sewing machine’s used every single day. I’ve just recently, actually a couple of years ago I had to have a malignant melanoma cut out of my foot and I got quite involved then with of course the MacMillan nurses at the local hospital. I’ve made three for them to make money from they’ve actually got one for their tea party which is at the end of the month. This time at the hospital. And if I’d got, you know, an inspiration, I’ve got so much fabric here. I think ‘oh, I’ll make that they can have that for next year’. So that’s something I, I’ve done a lot. I’ve also over the years made about twenty quilts for St Catherine’s Hospice and given to them. Because it’s something, an insurance policy that I don’t have to go in there myself.
JB: Yes, hopefully you won’t.
JW: But we all know people who have been in the hospice and have received benefit and we’ve had an awful lot, unfortunately, members of our group over the years. Must be about seven or eight of them at least have had to go in there. And so I don’t mind. And also, as a group, if you remember, we made a quilt for them when they were trying to make a garden there. And we, they made over £2000 from our quilt that we made between us. Yes. That was a good thing to do. So, I do, I make quilts for all sorts. Just because. Like the other day my daughter, my granddaughter and daughter, came in because it was my granddaughter’s birthday and they said ‘what was I making’ so I showed my granddaughter, and she said ‘Oh, I love that, what are you making that for?’ So I said ‘Well, just because, you know’. ‘Oh. I love it’ she said. So I’m in the throes of making it bigger so she can have it. There’s her and her boyfriend are looking for a house so that can be their first bit, for them.
JB: Yes, yes. It’s lovely to think that you’re inspiring another generation even if she’s not making herself. The fact that she…
JW: I was really quite chuffed and so my daughter said ‘Are you sure?’ So she said ‘Yes’ And when she apparently when she went home her boyfriend was there and she said ‘Oh, I’ve had some winnings this morning’ she said ‘Nan is making us a fabulous quilt’. So, I’m really chuffed. Very.
JB: Lovely. Very much. Yes. I understand from everything you’ve been saying that quiltmaking is a very important part of your life.
JW: It is the number one, apart from the family, of course.
JB: Yes.
JW: Um, now I’m nearly eighty I’m finding it is keeping my brain going. The thing is you look at a quilt and you think, and somebody says like she did. She wants it made bigger, your mathematics, or your very greasy, mathematics from school has to come into play. You’re working it all out, everything is done in inches of course. I’m not going to go metric. All my stuff’s in inches and the Americans are never going to go metric anyway. Are they, Jacquie?
JB: No [laughs].
JW: And you have to work it out and using bits of paper, inch paper, you know. And you can, you… it’s amazing and it keeps your brain going. And sometimes in our group we get set by other people they set us a mystery quilt or a challenge with a ghastly piece of fabric, the most ghastly piece of fabric you can possibly find for sale. But that is the challenge. And I’ve done quite well at that over the years too. But it’s all good for the brain.
JB: And physically.
JW: Oh, yeah. Because I’ve got arthritic fingers and people would say ‘how do you do applique?’ But I make them do it. That’s the difference. I make them do it.
JB: I think it’s been lovely taking to you, Jean, and getting this all recorded and I’m really delighted that we’ve been able to do it.
JW: I hope that I’ve inspired some people.
JB: I think so, yes. Thank you very much.
JW: Okay. Thank you.