On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about color and dye with my guest, Carol Soderlund . An artist and educator for 25 years, Carol’s curiosity about the range of color derived from yellow, red, and blue dyes led to her creation of her Color Mixing system for dyers. Carol encourages the freedom of mixing color by eye with results-based samples to guide the student. A former high school teacher, Carol was nominated for Teacher of the Year in 2013 and again in 2...
Jan 01, 2018•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 55
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about quilting and music with my guest, Ricky Tims . Ricky Tims has successfully blended two diverse passions into one very unique and interesting career. His skills as a pianist, composer and producer have been evident by the thousands who have heard his music. He is known in the international world of quilting as a best-selling author , enthusiastic and encouraging teacher, an award-winning quilter, fabric designer , and a...
Dec 18, 2017•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 54
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast is our second annual community episode. In this very special episode I invite you, the listeners, to recommend great stuff you're enjoying right now. A few weeks ago I put a call out on the blog and in my newsletter asking listeners to recommend a book, app, website, tool, notion, or podcast that they would recommend to a creative friend. I heard from so many of you! I put all of your recommendations together in this episode! My co-host f...
Dec 04, 2017•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 53
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about building a sewing community with my guest, Shea Henderson. A former middle school math teacher, Shea Henderson now owns Empty Bobbin Sewing Studio, a sewing and quilt pattern company. She is the author of the award winning book School of Sewing: Learn it. Teach it. Sew Together. and her work has been featured in several books and magazines. She is one of founding members and a former president of the Kansas City Modern...
Nov 18, 2017•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 52
On today’s special episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I’m so saddened by this morning’s news that Nancy Zieman has passed away. Nancy was a huge inspiration to me, and to so many of us. As a woman, a business person, and a working mom, Nancy lived her life with grace. She worked hard, had an excellent moral compass, and set a high bar for all of us to reach when it comes to being a participant in the sewing and quilting industry. In May, a few months before she got sick with cancer a...
Nov 14, 2017•55 min•Ep. 51
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I recorded my time at Quilt Market in Houston last week. We had a discussion about the state of the quilting industry with three quilt shop owners: Janet Lutz, Karen Montgomery, and Kris Thurgood. Janet Lutz is the owner of Calico Gals , a quilt shop located in Syracuse, NY. Janet is also the founder of Row by Row Experience , a program which reaches over 3,000 quilt shops worldwide. Karen Montgomery has owned The Quilt Company , a full s...
Nov 06, 2017•1 hr•Ep. 50
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about building a successful career in quilting with my guest, Eleanor Burns . Eleanor Burns is truly a star in the quilting industry. She entered the field in 1978 with a self-published book, "Make a Quilt in a Day-Log Cabin Pattern.” Her innovative techniques in "strip piecing" made quilting possible for busy sewers and remains popular today. Eleanor’s signature technique is to take time treasured patterns and make them qui...
Oct 16, 2017•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 49
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about building a fabric company with my guest, Arvin Pairavi. Arvin is the President and Co-Owner of Shannon Fabrics , a family owned importer and distributor of plush fabrics. Arvin joined the company in 2000 to work with his father and has helped grow Shannon Fabrics from a small business to a team of more than 50 employees. In this interview we trace the Pairavi family's history in the fabric business. Arvin's grandfather...
Oct 02, 2017•59 min•Ep. 48
On today’s special episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're celebrating the second anniversary of Craft Industry Alliance , the trade association for makers, designers, suppliers, and content creators in all areas of craft. Founded in October of 2015 by myself and Kristin Link (of S ew Mama Sew ) Craft Industry Alliance now has over 1,300 members! For this episode we're bringing five of those members onto the show to talk about their businesses and their relationship to the organizat...
Sep 25, 2017•56 min•Ep. 47
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we’re talking about building a career as a designer with my guest, Christine Ricks. Christine is the Creative Director for Missouri Star Quilt Company’s publishing department, working with a team to design and produce their magazines, Block and Modblock . She’s trained as a graphic designer and has taken up quilting as another medium to express her creative self. Christine spent the 10 years prior to her current position working in surfac...
Sep 18, 2017•57 min•Ep. 46
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we’re talking about building an innovative company in the sewing industry with my guest, Fred Drexler. Fred, along with his wife, Joyce, founded Sulky of America , a premier thread and stabilizer company. Fred began his career in the sewing industry in 1965 at age 23 as a salesman for the Singer Company in Akron Ohio. In 1969, he opened his own Singer dealership in Punta Gorda, Florida and met Joyce in 1974. She founded Speed Stitch, the ...
Sep 04, 2017•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 45
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about cross stitch with my guest, Jamie Chalmers, also known as Mr X Stitch . Jamie took up cross stitching fifteen years ago and he’s never looked back. Since establishing the Mr X Stitch website in 2008, he has been showcasing new talent in the world of textiles and stitch and has curated a number of stitch-based exhibitions in the UK and Ireland. Jamie is an accomplished and internationally exhibited artist in his own rig...
Aug 20, 2017•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 44
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I'm at Stitches United in Hartford, CT, talking with Benjamin Levisay, CEO of XRX, Inc., publishers of XRX Books as well as promoters of STITCHES Expos. Benjamin is a second-generation partner in this 31-year-old company originally started by his uncle, Alexis Xenakis, his father, David Xenakis, and their partner Elaine Rowley. Benjamin has been a part of the fiber industry since his family opened a yarn shop in Sioux Falls, SD when he wa...
Aug 07, 2017•56 min•Season 1Ep. 43
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about building a career as a quilter with my guest, Sue Bleiweiss. I’m here visiting Sue in her home studio in Pepperell, Massachusetts which is about 45 minutes from my home and is a beautiful place to visit in July. Sue creates vibrant colorful art quilts intended to delight the eye of the viewer and draw them in for a closer look. The author of several books, she has written numerous articles for Quilting Arts Magazine, a...
Jul 17, 2017•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 42
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I'm talking with Alissa Haight Carlton. Alissa is a modern quilter, designer, author and the co-founder and Executive Director of the Modern Quilt Guild (MQG). She has written two quilting books, Modern Minimal and Block Party. When not working in the quilting world, she heads up casting for Project Runway. Alissa lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two sons. Alissa tells the story of the founding of the MQG and how it's run today. ...
Jul 03, 2017•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 41
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about sewing magazines and television with my guest, Ellen March. Ellen March is the Community Content Director for the sewing division of F+W Media, including the Sew News, Creative Machine Embroidery, BurdaStyle, Sew Daily and Sew it All brands. She’s appeared on several television shows spreading her love of sewing, most notably Hallmark’s Marie Osmond Show and DIY Network’s Uncommon Threads, and she hosted Sew it All TV ...
Jun 19, 2017•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 1
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we’re talking about running a fabric company with my guests, Kathy Miller and Michael Steiner. Kathy and Michael are the co-founders of Michael Miller Fabrics . We begin by talking about Kathy's and Michael's careers before co-founding the company together. Kathy and Michael then explain how they met and came together to form their own fabric company. Michael Miller Fabrics has evolved considerably since its early days and you'll hear how...
Jun 05, 2017•1 hr•Ep. 1
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about building a lifelong career in sewing with my guest, Nancy Zieman. Nancy Zieman is an author, designer, businesswomen, TV producer, blogger and national sewing authority. She’s the host of the popular show Sewing With Nancy® , which appears exclusively on public television stations across the United States and Canada. You can watch Sewing With Nancy ® online at nancyzieman.com . In this interview Nancy traces the histor...
May 15, 2017•58 min•Ep. 1
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we’re talking about building a career as a modern quilter with my guest, Jen Carlton Bailly . Jen is a founder of the Portland Modern Quilt Guild , the largest modern quilt guild in the world. She had a career in retail before becoming a mother and modern quilter and carries many of lesson she learned in those years over to her current work. In this conversation we talk about discovering a craft community online and in person. Jen explain...
May 01, 2017•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 40
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about building an online presence on Instagram with my guest, Nichole Vogelsinger. Nichole has a beautiful new book out with Lucky Spool, Wild Boho: Modern Projects from Traditional Stitches (affiliate link). She's also partnered with an assortment of sewing brands including fabric and notions companies. Nichole has built tremendous momentum for her work by using Instagram to show what she's doing and forge connections. She ...
Apr 17, 2017•56 min•Ep. 39
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about owning a quilt shop with my guest, Heather Givans . We recorded this episode in Savannah, Georgia, at Quilt Con 2017. The show was so inspiring and I was excited to have the opportunity to sit down with an equally inspiring guest to talk more about this industry. Heather is a creative force; fabric store owner, fabric designer, quilt designer, national instructor, artist, and art educator. Heather creates community whe...
Apr 03, 2017•48 min•Ep. 38
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I'm talking with Dean Neumann and Penny McMorris about Electric Quilt, the quilt designs software company they co-founded 26 years ago. After the Air Force and then graduate school, Dean was a Professor of Mathematics at Bowling Green State University for 25 years. He received a hand-me-down computer from his son in the late 1980s, and quickly became a self-taught computer programmer just for fun. His wife, Penny McMorris, was the corpora...
Mar 20, 2017•56 min•Ep. 37
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about the sewing and quilting industry with my guest, Pokey Bolton. Pokey Bolton was introduced to art quilting and the related needle arts in 1998, and ever since she took her first stitch (a fly) and embroidered her first motif (a spider), she has been entangled in this industry and doesn’t envision herself getting free. Art quilting and mixed-media have, quite literally, taken over her life—so much so that she left her do...
Mar 06, 2017•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 36
On today’s special episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I’m at QuiltCon 2017 and I’m honored to have been able to sit for a few minutes with Katherine Jones who has won Best in Show for her quilt, Bling. Kat is from Tasmania, Australia and I caught her just a few hours before she had to catch a flight back home. We sat on the grass outside the convention center and chatted about her extraordinary paper pieced quilt. Kat has had award winning quilts in QuiltCon in years past, but she ha...
Feb 26, 2017•19 min•Ep. 35
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we’re talking about launching a kit and pattern business with my guest, Susan Fitzgerald. Susan lives near me, in the Boston area, so we were actually able to record this interview in person in Susan’s beautiful studio. Susan Fitzgerald designs modern cross stitch kits and patterns. Her work features stitching on unconventional materials like wood, leather, and acrylic. Her innovative designs have been featured in a number of cross stitch...
Feb 20, 2017•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 34
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about blogging, and illustration, and newsletters with my guest Claire Robertson. Claire is an Australian artist and illustrator based on the Pacific North West island of Salt Spring, in British Columbia, Canada. She weaves the whimsy of her island life into her work, incorporating the local flora and fauna in her characteristic style. She is well known for her much loved blog loobylu.com which she began in 1999, and for whi...
Feb 06, 2017•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 33
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast I've asked quilter Thomas Knauer to talk about the state of the quilting industry right now. Knauer is an academic as well as an award winning quilter and he views the industry in a way that I feel is unusual and thought-provoking. He talks about the relationship between the quest for perfectionism and quilting and how that leads to consumerism. Thomas also feels that "the quilting industry has nothing to do with quilts," a statement I as...
Jan 16, 2017•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 32
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we’re talking about building a business in fashion sewing with my guest Mimi Goodwin, whom you might know as MimiG. Mimi is a mother, businesswoman, and award winning, trend expert and Editor-in-Chief of the popular fashion, lifestyle, and DIY blog, MimiGStyle.com . What started off as a hobby in her Los Angeles home in 2012, has blossomed into an international brand with daily engagement of more than 1.M followers. We talk about : What w...
Jan 09, 2017•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 31
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're hearing voices from the community. It's the 2016 Community Episode! A few weeks ago I put a call out on my blog and in my newsletter asking you to record yourself and send it to me. I got so many entries! Thank you. Specifically I asked if you would recommend something you're loving right now. So this episode is full of amazing recommendations for books, apps, websites, notions, tools, and other podcasts you'll love. I asked my good...
Dec 19, 2016•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 1
On today’s episode of the Craft Industry Alliance podcast we're talking about product development with my guest, Annie Unrein. A creative lifetime quilter, Annie Unrein of Patterns by Annie and ByAnnie.com has been designing patterns and teaching since 2000. With a focus on practical and useful projects, Annie's patterns appeal to a sewists of all ages and levels. Annie is the creator of ByAnnie's Soft and Stable, an innovative product she designed to add body, stability and a professional finis...
Dec 05, 2016•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 1
