8 Ways Memory Quilting Heals the Heart

Aug 30

Written By

In 2001, I decided to chuck my stash. I was bored with all my materials and after years of making quilts and successfully selling them at the local farmer's market. I was tired of the cycle of consuming and I wanted to collaborate with people in more meaningful ways.

I pivoted from an object based art practice, where I made decorative quilts for people's homes, to a service based practice, making quilts for people during times of transition, from the meaningful materials they brought to me, such as the clothing of a loved one who had died.

I soon realized the healing power of making memory quilts with intention, which I call Passage Quilting. Over years of working with people in the midst of change and loss, distinct correlations between Passage Quilting and the healing process of bereavement became apparent:

The Clothing Left Behind is the gift that keeps telling the story of the person who gathered them, wore them over time and left them behind. The gift of their clothing will become the expressive material for the beautiful quilt to be made. As you make the quilt from their clothing you are in a way collaborating with the beloved.
Choosing The Clothing is an opportunity to gather together and actively remember, share and tell the stories of a person's life, relationships and death.
Cutting/Ripping The Clothing Apart is a definitive acknowledgment of change and the beginning of transformation. The word bereavement comes from the root word “reave” that literally means being torn apart. Losing a loved one has been described as being like a branch that is torn off a limb.
Remembering The Body through the architecture of the clothing, the personal essence of the beloved remains present. It is the starting point for the improvisational piecework.
Improvisational Piecework, piecing the quilt top without a predetermined pattern, provides a model for trusting the reorientation of life’s patterns after a loss or major life transition.
Hand Quilting provides an opportunity for reflection, meditation and prayer. It serves as a safe container for the experience of intense emotions and the touching of grief over time.
Quilting Together can be an opportunity for sharing emotions, memories and stories of the beloved in fellowship with others.
The Finished Quilt is functional, providing warmth, comfort and consolation. It serves as a vehicle for remembering and celebrating the life and personality of the beloved. As a transformational object it assists those left to transcend the particular stories of loss, and instead acknowledge and be consoled by their ongoing yet transformed relationship with the beloved.

The process of Passage Quilting, memory quilting with healing intention, can apply to any life transition including divorce, empty nest, menopause, career changes, marriage and birth, as well as death.

Called to Service / Passage Quilting Livestream Seminar + Workshop

More than ever, due to the traumatic losses from Covid-19, quilt makers all over the world, are being called into the service of making healing memory quilts. That’s why I’m offering a livestream, in-depth Passage Quilting seminar and hands-on workshop based on my 20 year practice. You are invited to join me for the seminar only or for both the seminar and the workshop.

September 16, 7-9 PM ET (Register for Seminar Only)
Passage Quilting Memory Quilts presentation/discussion on improv quilting as an embodied healing process for bereavement, loss and transition.
September 18, 25, 26, 11 AM - 3 PM ET (Register for Seminar + Workshop)
3-part intensive workshop covering rituals and the emotional energy around clothing preparation and hand-piecing techniques on Day 1, Improvisational piecing techniques, composition and honoring the architecture of the clothing on Day 2, more composition, and healing hand work rituals on Day 3.

Passage Quilting Conversation at the International Quilt Museum

I will be sharing my personal journey of Passage Quilting after the loss of my mother and grandmother at the International Quilt Museum on September 3, 5:30-6:30 PM Central. Yes I will be there IN-PERSON, but if you don’t live close by, you can sign up to stream it live through the link above. It’s a free event!