Written by: Joy Waggener
Publicity Chair for 2009 Quilt Show
Christine Barnes' website
If you saw the September program, you know what beautiful quilts and garments
Christine makes. She also talked about her favorite subject — the use of
color in quilts. Her goal in programs and workshops is to remove the fear that
many of us feel about choosing colors for our quilts. She says “Everyone can do
color, not just people with backgrounds in art. Through practice, you develop a
color sense. You just have to keep working at it.”
Christine is a Foothill area native, born in
Auburn and raised in Loomis. She
graduated from UC Davis with a major
in Costume and Textile Design and then earned a Masters in Journalism
at the University of Oregon. A couple of summers spent interning
at Sunset Magazine led to five years of living in the Bay Area
and a full-time job in the Book Division of Sunset Publishing.
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In 1983, Christine moved to Grass Valley and began the freelance
writing and design work that still occupies most of her time.
At first, she wrote mostly for Sunset, editing books about sewing,
decorating, and remodeling. She also took on technical editing assignments
for That Patchwork Place — making sure that the instructions
in quilt books were clearly and accurately written. Her friendship
with Velda Newman (another of our Celebrity Quilters) led to
a book written in 1996 by Christine that captured Velda's unique 
techniques. It was followed in 1997 by Color: The Quilter's Guide,
which is Christine's best-known work and the basis for the classes
and workshops that she teaches at guilds and shops all over Northern
California.
Ironically, Christine claims that she did not learn about color in school but from her uncle, who is an artist
in Mendocino. She recalls turning to him for advice when she was assigned to write about color for a Sunset
book. His tutorial included paint-mixing experiments and training in the use of the color wheel, which Christine
translated to fabrics and applied to her quilt projects. Many of her original wearable art and quilt designs
are available as patterns on her website: ChristineBarnes.com.
Christine has appeared on Simply Quilts and had articles published in QNM, Threads, and For the Love of
Quilting. Watch for an article on color in a 2009 issue of American Quilter, the
American Quilting Society magazine. She will also be teaching color at Asilomar
in 2009 and 2010, but you can catch her closer to home at Sugar Pine Quilt
Shop when she offers the “Happy Jacket” workshop on November 8 and 22.
Christine has been an active member of the Pine Tree Quilt Guild for many
years and served as Mystery Gift co-chair for two years. She has taught at Jamboree
several times, collected many ribbons at local quilt shows and the Fair,
and recently had an art quilt shown at the Pacific International Quilt Festival in
Santa Clara. We are very proud to have Christine Barnes as one of the featured
Celebrity Quilters of Nevada County at the 2009 Quilt Show.
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