About
Kathleen has been making quilts for over twenty years.
What started as a practical craft became a fine art practice — one that now occupies a full studio and a life organized around cloth.
The work
Kathleen grew up watching her grandmother piece quilts at the kitchen table — utilitarian objects made from worn-out clothing, nothing wasted. That early education in material thinking never left her.
After studying fine art in the 1990s, she returned to quilting not as a hobby but as a medium. The quilt form — its grid, its layers, its history — gave her a structure to push against.
Today her work sits at the intersection of abstract painting and textile tradition. She works in a studio in western Massachusetts, dyeing her own fabric, hand-quilting every piece, and taking her time.
Process
Dyeing
Most fabric is dyed in the studio using fiber-reactive dyes and natural pigments. Color relationships are worked out in the dye bath before a single seam is sewn.
Piecing
Design happens at the design wall — a large flannel surface where fabric can be auditioned, moved, and reconsidered. There are no patterns. Each composition is improvised.
Quilting
Every piece is hand-quilted. The quilting line is not decoration — it is drawing. It adds a third layer of mark-making to the surface.
Recognition
Interested in a commission?
I take a limited number of commissions each year. Each piece is made specifically for its space and its owner.
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