The "Not Really President's Challenge" entries and winners.

Alright then, better late than never, here is the blog post about the "Not Really President's Challenge" A short note on the title of that. Most guilds have a President's Challenge once a year, but we are a guild that doesn't really have a president. When our last president resigned, no one wanted to step up and take the reins. But at the same time, we all loved being part of the guild and did not want to let it dissolve, so we decided to share the responsibilities around, and keep things running. Sort of like a collective. We still have a treasurer, and various people who do various things, and we keep it all running. But since there is no actual President we thought (those of us who were organizing the challenge) that we should call it the "Not Really President's Challenge". You know, since we are not really Presidents. 

So, that being explained, let me explain the challenge to you. On the day that we issued the challenge we brought in a big stack of magazines. Magazines about lots of different things, from fashion, to hunting, to food to anthropology. And then we picked a number at random (I think it was 63) and then we each grabbed a magazine and turned to the 63rd page and ripped it out. And from that randomly chosen page we had to draw our inspiration. It could be any aspect of that page that we chose as inspiration: the colours, the shapes, the words, the images - anything. Here's a good example. 

This was the page that Adrienne pulled out of her magazine:

And this is the mini quilt that she made based on the inspiration page:

Isn't that lovely? She used the colours and lines of the hair, face and eyes of the model as a jumping off point for her composition and colour palette. And came up with a really beautiful, almost sculptural mini quilt. 

Laura also looked at the colours and shapes of the picture to make her quilt. I really love this colour scheme, and would love to see this mini quilt as a full sized quilt. Wouldn't that look fantastic on a bed?

Karen chose to be inspired by the text on her page, which to be fair, was mostly text! There was a reference to the "Berry Growers Association of Ontario" on it, so she made these two small, whimsical quilts with ants carrying strawberries on their backs. 

Doris made this simple, yet elegant quilt, inspired by an add for Californian Closets (that I neglected to take a photo of. Sorry!). There is so much great texture here, and it is all hand quilted. 

Rebecca made this intensely quilted little modern beauty, though as one of the Not Really Presidents she was not able to compete. But its such a fun project that it was worth it just to participate. 

Catherine I. got this add for shampoo in her random pick...

…and used the cascading hair of the model as inspiration for her amazing assemblage of small, quilted squares. They are white on the front, and red on the back and are all suspended from nearly invisible thread from a supporting bar. I love the way they fall and hang individually - it really adds to the overall impact of the project. 

And I was just so in love with this little quilt. The colours and quilting and the great use of fabric (that grey print in the smoke is killing me) is so great. Its inspiration was a page of an article about the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. I remember that because I actually had a conversation with the maker of this entry about it, but sadly, I can't remember who that maker was! I'm going to blame lack of sleep on that one. Please message me on Facebook and let me know if this is your amazing little quilt. I'll edit the post to add your name, asap! 

This was Lynda's inspiration page (a Miu Miu add, if I'm not mistaken. Or maybe something by Prada…).

And here is her gorgeous mini quilt. Look at that quilting! And I love the graphic impact it has. Amazing. 

Catherine C. had a picture of race cars on a track as her inspiration page, and came up with this high octane composition (see what I did there?). I love the energy of this one. And that little yellow zip along the binding is fabulous. 

All the quilts were laid out annonymously around the table, and the entire guild voted on who the winner should be. Then we, the Not Really Presidents voted and chose a second quilt to win the Not Really President's Choice. Both winner were awarded rosettes made by Rebecca and the guild chosen winner won a years membership to the Textile Museum of Canada. 

And so, drumroll please…..

...Doris was the grand winner of the Not Really President's Challenge.

And Lynda was the recipient of the Not Really President's Choice award. 

And there you have it, the proud winners and their outstanding entries! 

Congratulation to the winners and kudos to all the rest of those who made entries, because there was a lot of great work there. Next year we will have to get more sponsors so we can give out more prizes!