While I was sewing all those little triangles in my Creatrix series I was thinking that it would all be worth it as I could enter some of the Creatrix quilts into the 2024 Quilt Symposium . But when the conditions of entry came out and it was stipulated that any quilts entered must not have been exhibited elsewhere or shown on social media. I was gutted that they wouldn’t be seen by the wider quilt community.

I began thinking about what I was going to do, I didn’t have the headspace to be thinking of a new design, after I have done a year of creating these pieces I need a rest before I start creating my next series and I didn’t feel that I had the creative capacity to come up with something new. So, I thought let’s not reinvent the wheel, I can do something with what I have in my Creatrix series. I started making components with a vague idea of where I wanted to head.

In amongst this I was not looking forward to another winter in Twizel and said to The Builder that we needed to settle on a place to live – he said okay, find something. We had been looking at the Tasman area for the past year but, although we tried, nothing was gelling for us there, and we were concerned about the distance from family. So, I went into the real estate website typed into the search boxes what I wanted and ended up with three properties in the Canterbury area. Long story short we drove up to Christchurch to view the properties. The property we were keen on was going to a deadline sale later that day. We both agreed, that was the property for us and put in an offer. We were the successful offer, and the vendor wanted settlement in three weeks!!

Back in Twizel I looked at what I had made so far and tossed up just forgetting about exhibiting at Symposium later that year, but I had my heart set on doing the piece it almost had a life of its own and was begging me to put the effort in. So I knuckled in and solidly worked on my entry. By the time we moved I had most of the components made just had to put it all together, so once we settled, I locked myself away in the office and I sewed until it was complete.

Creatrix: She Who Creates won the Art Quilt prize and Best of Show at Symposium 2024. I was very humbled and surprised to have won Best of Show. I’m so proud that my art is out there for people to see and that some people think its worthy of this accolade.