Nic Bridges is a professional longarm quilter, artist, designer and teacher whom we met at Be Creative By the Sea at Coffs Harbour. She makes fantastic textile postcards, journal covers, quilts and much more and, this month, Nic shares her talents, and her story, with us.

Nic has been making a living from quilting since 2002 after leaving the corporate world where, for years, she’d worked as an administration manager. A hobbyist quilter for close to 20 years, it was when she bought a longarm quilting machine - a purchase that can set one back at least $30,000 - that she decided she needed to “justify” the expense.

“My children were teenagers, a time when I think, more than ever, you need to be in the house when they get home from school and so forth,” says Nic. “My husband was supportive. He didn’t think it was outrageous. I had joined the Southern Cross Quilters in the late 1990s - the best friends I’ve ever had in my life - and they encouraged me too.”

Still, Nic says quilting cannot serve as the key income for the household.  “Quilting’s not particularly well paid. You’ve got to love it,” she says. “But it’s an opportunity to lead a creative life and now I teach, which I adore... sometimes I think I almost prefer it to quilting.”

On her blog recently she wrote: “One of my favourite things about teaching is the absolute pleasure I get from seeing my students take my design concept, add their own life experience and personal aesthetic, and come up with a quilt that is truly their own.

“Even though my classes are mostly technique driven, students have the opportunity to bring something of themselves to the work. It is fabulous to see them produce work which clearly expresses their own vision and taste. Before I began teaching, I wouldn’t have guessed what joy it could bring me.”

Nic’s professional career began with submitting projects to magazines which then led to invitations to teach. “Longarm quilting can be an isolating job,” she says. “That was actually the hardest thing for me. I was used to a work environment with lots of people... the isolation didn’t really suit me. Teaching gives me the ideal balance.”

Nic is also an avid student who says, “When you stop learning you start dying.” Today she attends art classes and is working towards a Diploma of Fine Art, all of which she finds feeds back into her quilting.”

Her current personal work is very art related, moving further away from traditional styles. “I still do the traditional stuff on clients’ quilts but my own work is inspired by nature. I am passing on this approach in my contemporary technique classes where we look at different schools of thought, techniques and skills.

“This is really the starting point for making art quilts,” explains Nic. “For instance, if I am working on something like a ‘four seasons’ quilt’ I might begin with an image of a tree then look at ways of embellishing that. In the end I might use a combination of paint and stitching. I use the thread to provide the visual and tactile texture and as a drawing tool. At the moment I am using paint on sheer
fabrics like silk organza and polyester organza. It’s creating great effects.”

Nic is also in a collaborative phase having produced a work - Bushfire Sunset - with fellow quilter, Lisa Walton (see her work at www.dyedheaven.com [dyedheaven.com] and blog at www.fibreinspirations.blogspot.com [fibreinspirations.blogspot.com]), which has been accepted into the Houston Quilt Festival. “We went to Houston three years ago and it was an amazing experience,” says Nic.

Name
Nic Bridges

Based
Wollongong, Australia

Website
www.nicquiltz.com [nicquiltz.com]

Email
nicquiltz@gmail.com

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