Upcoming Trends in Quilting and Sewing
Posted by Deirdre Quirk on Oct 1st 2018
Curious what trends you'll be seeing in the fiber art world? Today we share our own predictions for upcoming trends; feel free to share your own thoughts in the comments!
Liz: Tea bag quilting: quilts using embellished tea bags as quilt embellishment. Quilting Arts Magazine recently closed a reader challenge on visible mending for their February/March 2019 issue.
Tea bag quilts from LuAnn Kessi
Roxane: Ha! I normally do not share my thoughts on trends, but for this I'll make an exception. Right now embroidery itself is a trend. I think that in embroidery in particular there is a move to try your own thing and be improvisational—it's not your grandmother's needlework. For sewing, it's clear there is a trend back towards garment-making. It's a great way to add your own style. In quilting, the quilting itself seems to be trending in a way. I see a lot more people trying to quilt their own quilts, and those who can already quilt are trying new things like learning to use new tools, playing with thread weights and colors, and more.
Dawn: I am certainly not an expert in this industry, but I do know that C&T Publishing always has their hand in what is new and hot. As a hardcore bibliophile, I am chomping at the bit to get my hands on the many stories by Carol Dean Jones. How cool is it to have a piece of a good book literally come to life by having the opportunity to create a quilt from it!!
Gabriel: One trend I would like to see is the crossover of the quilting, sewing, and embroidery worlds with the art world. Here are two examples of creatives working as fabric artists: Nick Cave at https://art21.org/artist/nick-cave/ and Ben Venom at www.benvenom.com.
April: I've noticed a new willingness to try different hand-crafting techniques. I think knitting and crocheting were really becoming cool again a few years ago, and I'm now seeing a younger audience finding their own cool take on sewing and embroidery.
Todd: Jen says that V and Co fabric is very popular right now on Instagram. I also think it is safe to say that emoji is a trend that some smart person spotted. Color by numbers is super hot on Etsy and Instagram. In general, I think it would be cool to see what search terms are trending on Instagram, Google, Amazon, etc.
Debbie: I am delighted to see rainbows all around! There are fabric lines with the full spectrum, and patterns for quilts and stitchery exploding with ROYGBIV.
Jennifer: I think there’s a move toward modernizing traditional crafts or reimagining what can be done with traditional techniques. Just look up “embroidery art,” and you’ll see some amazing work, from detailed portraits to landscapes that leap off the embroidery hoop (literally!).
Kerry: This may just be where my mind is right now, but I think that organizing your thoughts, sewing projects, and special dates in a journal or date keeper like our Quilter's Date Keeper by Bonnie Hunter seems to be an up-and-coming trend.
Jen: Embroidery that stays in the hoop for display seems like a trend that arrived a while ago and continues to have staying power. Portrait embroidery is trending too: faces and pets and whole families.
Sarah: From some of our distributor customers, I keep hearing that nature projects are trendy and specifically those that feature botanicals and birds. Embroidery in general is trendy and seems to be one of the hottest-selling soft crafts lately (again per our customers). What's always requested are books showing quick and easy projects and titles that feature weekend projects, and high quantities of projects for reasonable prices are always popular. Value is key.
