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2026 Session 4

Instructors

Friday, April 24 – Wednesday, April 29

Sue Benner

Floral Arrangement

Making beautiful flowers, intricate concentric patterns, block design, and experimenting with exotic fabrics are all included in this class. Learn Sue’s layered construction technique for cutting, assembling, and arranging flowers. You will gain confidence in your drawing and design skills as you interpret and adapt different types of flowers and petals for your designs. 


Level: All Levels

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suebenner.com

Priscilla Bianchi

Stripe Revolution

Priscilla presents various techniques and simple, surprising ways to create an infinite variety of geometric shapes with stripes. She encourages students to replicate her samples and through this experimentation they will develop their own quilt design. Required lab fee includes a kit of assorted hand-woven Guatemalan textiles in an incredible array of colors, textures, and patterns. 


Level: All Levels

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priscillabianchi.net

Missie Carpenter

For the Love of Bees

This sweet project can be finished as is or as the center for a larger quilt. It is not as intimidating as one may think! Missie has some unique methods and notions that make detailed projects a breeze: starch basting (prepared edge) shapes for precision placement and fast sewing; 1/8” stems; tiny petals and buds, sharp points, EPP options and more with ease. You will leave class inspired! 


Level: All Levels

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traditionalprimitives.com

Meri Henriques Vahl

Layered Fabric Collage 

Learn an easy and fun technique of rawedge landscape collage and my unique, simple way to add people to your quilts. Bring your favorite photograph or idea for inspiration, lots of straight or safety pins, fine tulle, batting and the fabric you’ll need to make your artistic vision come true. Meri will show you how to add borders – or even more sections to create a quilt of any size. 


Level: All Levels


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meriartquilts.com

Denise Labadie

Sacred Stonescapes 

Denise is known for her contemporary art quilt portraits of megalithic Celtic “stones” and monoliths, and more recent monastic ruins. Topics range from quilt design and finishing, to fabric painting, working with photos, and fully exploring the comparative strengths, benefits, effects, and use of key foundational compositional and texturing art quilt top construction techniques. 


Level: All Levels

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labadiefiberart.com

JoAnne Lincoln

Exploring Nature in Thread 

Create realistic birds using raw edge appliqué and detailed threadwork. Explore and stitch different components of the environment, arranging one or more of them to arrange into an original composition. We’ll cover stitching the intricate features of the bird and the elements of their environment such as weathered wood, bark, moss and other flora that will enhance its surroundings. 


Level: All Levels


Download Supply Sheet PDF

natureofthread.com

Betsy Habich

Thread Painting!

Create photorealistic images entirely from thread. Most students will finish one 8 ½” x 11” thread painting. Learn to make a quilt sandwich, how to use free-motion straight and zig-zag thread painting, color blending, make crisp edges, simplify complex backgrounds, paint animal eyes and fur, make deciduous and evergreen trees, handle sky and water, reflections and shadows. 


Level: Confident Beginner

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betsyhabich.com

Jenny Haynes

Fokus Quilt 

Students will be playing with different sized Drunkard’s Path blocks, color grading and wedges to create an optical illusion quilt. Jenny will guide you through the many possibilities whilst encouraging individuality and creativity. Based on her latest design that emerged from two of her previous works, the Hexibore quilt and the Tumbling Reels quilt. 

petals.


Level: Intermediate/Advanced


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pappersaxsten.com

Luke Haynes

Quilting on Purpose from start to finish

Luke will lead the class through a series of exercises that touch on all parts of quilting and show ways of thinking about each step more deeply. We all come from different skills and preferences. Within quilting, there are only a few skills, and it is important to touch on all of them to get our practice where we want it. The class will work on skills from technique to intentionality. 


Level: All Levels

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luke.art

Gloria Loughman

Landscape with Rhythm 

The sky has the potential to be the most exciting element to enhance and energize any landscape. Rhythm is defined as a combination of elements repeated but with variation. In this workshop we will play with repetition and pattern, decorating our sky to add movement and interest. We will create our skies by over-painting some interesting commercial fabrics. 


Level: All Levels

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glorialoughman.com

Jennifer Sampou

Sky is the Limit 

Hone your skills to master the use of color and gain a deeper understanding of hue and value play. Using basic sewing skills, create blocks to discover new color combos. Working with SKY or other ombrés, learn the nuance of shades and value. We will focus on simple blocks (HSTs, log cabins, or granny squares) to discover how colors interact, blend and transform. 


Level: Confident Beginner

Download Supply Sheet PDF

jennifersampou.com

Jane Sassaman

Totem of Life 

We will stylize some of your favorite characters in nature and arrange them into an interlacing appliquéd fabric collage – a colorful and graphic “Totem of Life”. Collect photos and prints of the characters that are candidates for your composition. We will stylize each object into graphic fabric shapes for appliqué. Your composition will evolve as your shapes begin to “play off” one another. 


Level: All Levels

Download Supply Sheet PDF

janesassaman.com

Randa Mulford

Artist in Residence

  • Home
  • Info
  • Gallery
  • Registration
  • 2026 Sessions
    • 2026 Artist-Faculty
    • Session 1 2026
    • Session 2 2026
    • Session 3 2026
    • Session 4 2026
    • Session 5 2026

Contact Us
Email: info@emptyspoolsseminars.com Call or Text: 925-222-5509

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