We have included a number of Sievers stories here during this past year. Thank you to everyone who shared their story with us as part of our 40th anniversary season! As part of the early Sievers School story, we found this in a 1981 flyer written by Walter Schutz. He begins, “Be the one…in your group of friends who can show off exquisite, one-of-a-kind hand woven jackets, scarfs, table linens, rugs, wall hangings. Be the one who is admired and perhaps envied for the skill of her hands. Be the one who has found contentment and happiness by doing something just for yourself for once. Be the one who has taken advantage of the joys and fulfillment that has come […]
Forty and forty-one
These were two of our favorite numbers this year! Forty for Sievers School’s 40th anniversary year and forty-one for our 41st season of teaching classes. With the origin of Sievers based on weaving, it was very appropriate that our last two classes were #40, Beginning Weaving with Nancy Adams and assistant, Susan Johnson and #41, Magic Carpet Ride:Rag Rug Weaving with Deb Sharpee. It was the perfect way to finish our 2019 season and mark those two milestones. From a variety of samples, perfect for beginning weavers, students learned the basics of weaving on a floor loom and were able to finish their first project and then go on to dress the loom and weave a second piece. Most of […]
Weavers all around
Recently, it was looms to the right of us and looms to the left in Rita Hagenbruch’s Halvdrall and Monk’s Belt class in the Sophie Studio, joined by Nancy Frantz teaching eight beginning weavers on our Sievers table looms in the Walter Studio. The samples Rita brought were so inspiring. Some commented that they could never bring themselves to actually use such fine handwovens. But Rita reminded them that unless they are used regularly at family dinners, holidays and the like, they don’t become heirlooms. Only when they are part of your memories do they become most valuable. This piece (also shown at the top of the page) was fresh off the loom at the time of the class visit […]
Stories
Each hand crafted piece has a story and the pieces made in last week’s Navajo Rug Weaving class and Open Quilt Studio all have their own stories. The reason for the choice of colors and design, who it may be given to and why, what it will remind the maker of each time they see it or what was happening around them during the process are all parts of the story. We have a story for you, too. Once upon a time, a group of people met at Sievers School for a Navajo Rug Weaving class with Betty Glynn Carlson. They started by warping the Navajo looms and choosing colors and designs that were to be the words of the […]
Batik & Beyond
It was 1982 when Mary Jo Scandin first came to Sievers and offered a class in Batik and Direct Dye Painting. Every year since then we have delighted in the return of “batik week”. Some of the students in this most recent class first came for batik in the mid-1980’s! What a wonderful journey it’s been together. Mary Jo’s piece, “Nighttime on a Hill” appeared on our brochure cover last year. Now, thanks to her, it is part of our permanent collection, a gift for all who walk through the doors of Sievers. Batik is a multi-step process and there are both active times dyeing and rinsing and quiet, meditative times drawing, waxing and ironing. The results are beautiful. Pam […]
We will be waiting for you
Those words were used 40 years ago by Walter Schutz in the first Sievers School class brochure and for many years that followed. They’re still true today! Each year since classes began in 1979, we await meeting new students and reconnecting with returning student-friends. Not only are we waiting for you, so are the instructors, fellow classmates, the studios, dormitory, favorite Washington Island places and the Sievers shop. As one way to mark our 40th anniversary year, we’ll occasionally share some of the “Sievers Stories” collected last year from students. In one, Kathy B. wrote, “I came for my first class in 1989 and took beginning spinning followed by intermediate spinning. When I think back, that was really ambitious for […]
One month
It has been almost one month since our last posting and it is almost one month until the first day of class, Open Quilt Studio on May 28th. So, what has been happening at Sievers this past month? Since the end of March we’ve been readying the shop and receiving yarns, books, fabrics and other fiber art necessities plus all the lovely handmade work of our students and teachers. Many new and fun things will be waiting for you! The shop will be open daily starting Monday, May 20th, from 10 am – 5 pm, although we’ve already had a few visitors stop in by happenstance this past week. Our Washington Island Art Association friends will be renting the Walter Studio […]
March-ing along
In late March, the seventh Quilts of Valor Foundation sewing event took place at Sievers School. Coordinated by Ellen Graf, Washington Island teams and helpers have made over 80 Quilts of Valor since 2013. Some of the quilts have been awarded on Washington Island, some to veterans who are known to the Island sew-ists and some have been given to the QOV Foundation to be distributed in military hospitals and veterans homes. Quilts of Valor Foundation (QOVF) is a national non-profit whose mission is to create comforting and healing quilts “for veterans and military service members touched by war.” Ten quilt tops (two of them stitched by a team in Arizona using some hand-dyed fabrics) were completed during this year’s […]
