For the Folk School’s first post-pandemic festival, I tied thousands of knots to hold this quilt together, reminding me of all the daily interactions I missed during the isolation of the pandemic. Attendees signed a hand-drawn reproduction of the quilt-top attached to the back of the piece. Watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed dress shirts (2022) 48”x60”
A memorial for my late grandmother made from her beloved purple velvet bathrobe. View my process content on Instagram here and listen to the whole story here on my podcast.
A collaborative piece with Heidi Parkes celebrating a new-found sense of abundance in the life of two working artists. View our process content on Instagram here and listen to our conversation about this quilt on my podcast here.
Repurposed materials, (2023) Approximately 45” x 45”
A recreation of a family burial-ground I visited in Laurens, South Carolina in 2019. Here, several of my white ancestors are buried in graves marked with elaborately carved tombstones. Around them are sunken graves marked only with an unhewn rock—likely the burial site of the people enslaved by my family. Outside the walls of this graveyard, there are more sunken graves, which raises the question for me of gate-keeping: who was allowed into the privilege space of my family, and who was kept out? On this quilt, you can see embroidered tombstones of my ancestors, as well as five memorial crosses with the known names of those enslaved by my family. Part of the Southern White Amnesia series. View my process content on Instagram here.
Repurposed materials (2023). Approximately 38” x 36”
A piece that examines my response to being read as straight by knife vendor at a market who felt they could confide their homophobia to me. View process content on Instagram here and listen to me discuss this quilt on my podcast here.
Salvaged linen and cotton sari. (2024) Approximately 60” x 36”
An allegory of a snake that whispers Whiteness into the world. It’s written using an ancient pattern of writing called boustrophedon, where instead of starting at the left side of the page, the line picks up directly under where the previous line ends, thus snaking the viewer’s eyes down the text. Made from velour, silk, and microfleece. Part of the Southern White Amnesia series. View my process content on Instagram here.
Text: our children are both with a snake in a crib this guardian serpent whispers silver tongued seeds into the open ears of our children that bloom later in life whispers like all this belongs to you whispers like you have all this because you worked so hard whispers like they don’t work hard like you
Repurposed materials (2023) Approximately 72” x 55”
Made from a partial dress shirt I found while walking Brighton Beach in November 2023. Watch the discovery here
Shirt, various repurposed textiles, (2023) approximately 51”x51”
Constructed from a garment that easily shows its history. Garment found in the middle of the street in NYC and shows how the past and present co-exist. Text from family letters during the American Civil War. Part of the Southern White Amnesia series. View my process content on Instagram here
Repurposed materials (2023) Approximately 48” x 36”
Made in the style of Southern Baptist church banners I grew up studying during long sermons, this piece is came to me in a dream: an ancestor handing me a writhing poisonous snake and told me it was the “work of the living” to untangle the injustices of our time. Part of the Southern White Amnesia series. View my process content on Instagram here.
Repurposed materials (2023) Approximately 80” x 60”
A quilt made from dozens of high-end silk ties. Collaboration with Amanda Nadig. Hand-sewn, hand-quilted. View our process content here and listen to our two-part documentary series here.
Repurposed silk neckties. (2023) 10.5’ x 2.5’
Quilt commissioned for the documentary film Maestra which follows six female orchestra conductors as they participate in the world-wide competition. Collaboration with Amanda Nadig. View our process content on Instagram here
Repurposed materials (2023) Approximately 65” x 65”
The project I completed during my TOSS residency reflects on materials and the people who inhabited them at one time. These pieces started with discarded tshirts from Opportunity Threads which stamps out a die-cut square from tshirts to make custom memory quilts. What I loved about the leftovers is that it forms a frame. What was there?
Salvaged materials (2022) 10 pieces, approximately 36”x24” each
A fan-style genealogical infographic illustrating how I personally benefit generations later from the wealth my family accrued during slavery. View my process content on Instagram here.
Repurposed materials, a silver dollar from my grandfather. (2024) Approximately 36” x 36”
A daily mandala-drawing practice led me to making this quilt. Over several weeks, a variety of symbols of personal significance emerged in my drawings that I think compiled into this quilt that tells the story of who I am. Watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed materials (2021) 65”x65”
A memory quilt I made alongside my aunt after the unexpected passing of my Uncle Jim. See my process content on Instagram here and listen to me share about this special quilt here on my podcast
Materials from my uncle’s closet (2023) Approximately 60” x 60”
Fashion-designer ERL reached out to me to help create this look for A$ap Rocky to walk the carpet at the Met Gala in 2021. I designed the red side of the quilt to create the big reveal when Rocky dropped the vintage puff quilt piece at the top of the Met stairs. Watch my quilt tour here
Made this quilt to fund raise for a friend’s school in Uganda with African wax prints they hand-selected. Watch my quilt tour here
Cotton (2021) 60”x60”
My burial quilt, named for all the red 7s floating around on it. At the end of my life I hope I still feel like I’ve hit the jackpot of life. Work in progress.
Repurposed and leftover materials (started in 2020) 85”x65”
I had so many things I wanted to make sure I remembered from my residency at John C Campbell Folk School, I made a quilt
Repurposed materials (2022) 60”x60”
This memory quilt honors Do, who loved her table linens and head scarves. Watch quilt tour here
Repurposed materials (2021) 65”x85”
A piece inspired by someone asking me if I couldn’t be a little less intimate in my work. You can watch my full discussion on this piece on SOFT BULK
The Sack of Sorrows is an ongoing community healing project. You can learn more about how to participate in the Sack of Sorrows here
Repurposed materials (2022) 36”x24”
A reflection on my evolving relationship with home: from the excitement of leaving home for the first time, the shift towards nostalgia, and the mixed joy of returning home. Completed during my residency at John C Campbell Folk School.
Repurposed materials (2022) 85”x36” each
Nobody buys brand-new smartphones with cracked screens, or shiny new cars with flat tires. So why do we do rip and bleach and fray our jeans? What story are we trying to tell about ourselves?
Repurposed blue jeans (2021) 75”x85”
When Melanie said she wanted a quilt that she could use in her funeral and then give to her two children, I got an idea for the modular quilt you see here. Watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed and found materials (2021) 85”x72”
Made for a dear friend as they wade through the adoption process. They’ve spent years waiting, and this project has helped make a future home for the lucky child that will get to join them. Watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed shirts (2021) 70”x70”
Family members across the US all mailed me fabrics to mark Teddy’s 40th birthday. You can see the notes that Teddy’s mom carefully pinned to each item of clothing to make sure the stories arrived intact. In order to keep these stories with the quilt, I made my first ever “swatch album” which contains swatches of the twelve most used fabrics in this quilt and a key that details their origins.
Repurposed clothing and table linens (2021) 65”x65”
There are a lot of nice things I wish America had. Not to sound ungrateful, but: universal healthcare, equity for our BIPOC folks, equity for our trans and queer folks, income equality, gun control, a humane immigration policy, quality public education, reliable elections, improved media literacy, and cleaner air and water, to name a few. Other places around the world have demonstrated that we can do better. It’s time for America to step up.
Vintage quilt top, circa 1950s with bolt fabric applique (2020) 65”x80”
This quilt was made with fun in mind, like Skate Night in elementary school. Remember that?
Repurposed dress shirts and bolt fabric (2017) 85x95”
I got three sides of the border on this quilt and I felt that I should stop and leave the bottom open. When we lose a loved one, something stays open. I still think about my Pa Ted nearly everyday. My partner’s Mamaw cooked kibbe in honor of her first husband every Thanksgiving for sixty years after his parting. It gives me comfort to know the door is not entirely shut, the mysteries of life not entirely resolved.
Repurposed shirts (2020) 65”x80”
Another memory quilt made from a loved one’s button-up shirts. All the plaid shirts must’ve inspired this quilt-top. While I was working on this one, I found myself thinking of all the unseen systems that sustain us when we need them. May we all feel that support and that love in our lives. Watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed men’s dress shirts (2020) 65”x80”
There are so many stories with this particular memory quilt, I’ll save them for the quilt tour. For now I’ll just say (once again! because I feel like I keep rediscovering what this means...) that when we’re entrusted with the clothing of someone else’s life, that fabric becomes sacred, and it’s on us as makers to treat them with reverence and maybe even head-scratching awe at times ✨
Repurposed men’s dress shirts (2021) 65”x80”
A remake of an old favorite! I’ve always loved how red and blue can buzz when you put them side by side like this. Hence the sunglasses. Watch quilt tour here
Organic cotton (2021) 85”x65”
Pure jazz is what I see when I look at this eggplant and cerulean blue palette. Made from repurposed dress shirts, this quilt has a worn-in softness that comes already broken-in. There’s a part of this quilt that for me is absolute magic: can you see the round egg-like shape floating halfway down the right-hand side?
Repurposed dress shirts (2019) 65” x 75”
These blocks were all made in response to various events in the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency. I made the centerpiece flag and left it detachable from the quilt so that it could be used in future social actions as needed.
Mixed fabrics: repurposed and bolt (2017) 70” x 85”
Every quilter has to make at least one red and white quilt in their life. I’ve made two. You can see the original Young Miss Augusta here and you can watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed cotton textiles (2021) 75” x 48”
This quilt is the answer to the first question I ever posed to fabric. It was 2015 and the world was watching streaming thousands of Syrians walking out of their country. This crisis seemed like a reckoning for humanity: how can we all get along? I took that question to my dresser full of fabrics and watched as rows came together, swelling and contracting in relation to their neighbors, and therein seemed an answer to my question.
Repurposed dress shirts (2015) 60”x70”
This community-thought-experiment started with my mom finding an antique quilt at a yard sale and gave it to me that Christmas (best gift ever!) I found myself wondering what kind of advice our own great-grandmothers, alive at the time this quilt was sewn, would offer us today. This piece was shared on social media with the intention of crowd-sourcing collective wisdom during trying times.
Antique 1800s quilt, repurposed bed linens (2020) 75” x 85”
I made this quilt on the road in the summer of 2018. I spent two months working on two different farms in the UK: mucking stalls, wrangling goats, learning what stinging nettle is. And then resting my weary muscles in the evenings, I would sit and sew. This quilt-top is all hand-pieced while traveling. The shape and size was determined by the trip itself.
Repurposed linen and cotton dress shirts (2018) 30” x 45”
Made with a combination of my old shirts and pants and new textiles, the Bedford Armory quilt was inspired by the shades that our clothing achieves over the course of its life. I love the fading gradient down various pant legs that are still visible in this piece.
Repurposed dress shirts, favorite pair of traveling pants, bolt fabric (2014) 65” x 85”
I feel so much joy when I see this quilt. I picture a head of cheetahs running through space with their wild blue hearts. This quilt is made from an old plaid shirt and cheetah-print fabric bought in Chinatown, along with sundry other patches to round out the palette.
Repurposed dress shirts and bolt fabric (2014) 65” x 80”
I made the Orange Crush quilt to highlight the natural forms that come from men’s dress shirts. The yoke of the neck remains as a visible motif in this composition. What I see when I look at this quilt is a cosmic swirl radiating from the center out, showering all the universe in good vibes. Watch my quilt tour here
Repurposed tablecloth, bed linens, and men’s dress shirts (2019) 65” x 65”
Jenny had spent nearly two decades living on a self-sufficient homestead in the countryside of Norway. When she moved back to New York a few years ago, she reached out to me to design a quilt out of her old clothes: a goat-milking skirt, a black linen dress she’d sewn herself, a rad polyester 70s robe. It looks right at home in her folk-art museum of a house in upstate New York.
Repurposed garments (2017) 95” x 95”
A quilt in the medallion tradition made of a mix of repurposed men’s dress shirts and store-bought fabric. This piece was made as a baby quilt, one that would shield the young child through their early years. It’s hand-quilted in Japanese sashiko cotton thread.
Repurposed dress shirts and bolt cottons (2014) 45”x65”
I made this quilt for my brother and sister-in-law in honor of their marriage, and I named it Poplar Camp because when I’m making the long drive home from New York to North Carolina, when I see the Poplar Camp exit off the highway, I know I’m getting close.
Cotton off the bolt (2014) 65” x 80”
This series was an exploration of how a single maker might create multiple pieces at once, mimicking mass-production on the individual scale. The Here quilts were made by stacking four sheets on top of one another, making three decisive cuts through all four layers, and rearranging them in different combinations. The effect is at once handmade and mass-produced.
Repurposed bed linens (2019) 54” x 72”
Neon tubes of pink light float over a background of deep cool hues. This quilt is an experimentation in creating depth on an essentially two-dimensional surface. I pieced the entire background together and then sliced it up to insert the pink bars. I especially love how the straight parallels create bars their own code when the quilt folds in on itself.
Repurposed men’s dress shirts and bolt fabric (2016) 65”x80”
Sometimes quilts just name themselves. There’s an intersection of patches that came together while making this quilt, and as soon as I saw it, it was like bumping into an old friend. Howdy, Littleneck.
Cotton off the bolt (2014) 45”x65”
As I walked around Guanajuato, I started collecting brightly-colored ice cream spoons were lying discarded on the sidewalk. I found myself getting mad at an industry that cranks out toy-colored disposable products in that will outlive the next 25 generations of our grandchildren. So I sewed them all on top of the quilt I was making, obscuring the patchwork underneath.
Found fabrics, used disposable spoons (2018) 30” x "48”
My mom taught for 38 heroic years before retiring. In her last year, one of her colleagues and I came up with an idea: I’d mail them a bunch of red fabric, they would go around the school getting people to write Mom well wishes on each scrap. She mailed it all back to me and I started working them into the quilt. My mom says she just sits there reading it some days, a thought that brings me immense joy.
Cotton off the bolt (2017) 55”x65”
How do we define wealth? I like what the Kwakwaka'wakw of the Pacific Northwest say: the rich person is not one who has amassed a lot of stuff, but rather the one that has a lot to give. In that spirit, this quilt was made to raise money for the Center for Urban Pedagogy and their work in public inner-city schools.
Repurposed dress shirts (2014) 36”x48”
The blue dye comes from a green leaf, and the pink dye comes from a brown pit. The avocado pinks were made possible through the generous donations of my lunchtime colleagues, and the lightest indigo blues were made in the company of dear friends in Kentucky, and the darker indigos back in Brooklyn. Watch my quilt tour here
Naturally dyed cotton muslin (2020) 55”x70”
The inspiration for this quilt comes from the scraps of another. I backed my Blue & Tan throw quilt with fabric a friend had brought back from the Philippines, and I wanted to use every bit of it that I could. So I began reconstructing the original border of the textile, and filling them in with traditional blues, reds, and a classic floral sheet from the seventies.
Repurposed sarong and bedsheets (2019) 48”x70”
This piece was an exploration of how shapes self-create in proximity to one another. All essentially rectangles, they form paddles and spouts, and clubs when they are placed next to each other. (Backed with with a textile brought back from the Philippines by a friend.)
Scrap fabric from backing other quilts (2019) 55”x75”
This quilt was inspired by the tile in the foyer of Cookie Lyons’s mansion on Empire. (God I loved her character.)
Repurposed dress shirts (2014) 80”x90”
Light refracted through a leafy woodland canopy. The kaleidoscopic effect created in this Cathedral quilt comes from a duplication and inversion of the upper-left quadrant, and then careful measuring to ensure alignment with other quadrants. Designed to be used as a burial quilt. Watch this IG reel to learn more
Repurposed tablecloth, bed linens, and men’s dress shirts (2019) 95” x 95”
Everything rests poised at a perfect angle of repose. Made from two thrifted bedsheets, A Careful Balance is a testament to the kinetics of inverted triangles and human existence. Designed to be used as a burial quilt. Watch this IG reel to learn more
Repurposed bedsheets (2017) 90”x95”
The negative space in the design of this baby quilt reminded me of a creek back home in North Carolina as it meanders from one side of the quilt to the other. Along the way are twists, turns, and surprises, but we always get there.
Repurposed dress shirts (2014) 36”x48”
This is the quilt where I fell in love with color. The red and blue of this piece have such a dynamism that the eye perceives them as actually vibrating. Since then, I always strive to find some kind of vibration, balance, or harmony in the colors I choose.
Bolt fabric (2014) 36”x90”
These three quilts were made for three sisters. Their mother had saved their favorite dresses from when they were little girls— which along with some of their dad’s dress shirts and one of mom’s dresses— we made three quilts that they could take with them as they left home for college.
Repurposed children’s clothing (2013) 65”x80”
In 2016 I organized a collaborative quilt project to create a quilted protest banner for the forty-three missing students from Ayotzinapa, Mexico. Over seventy quilters and textile artists contributed to the project. Each artist made a block dedicated to a student. I pieced them all together with the all-seeing eye as the centerpiece and delivered it to the families in Ayotzinapa.
Mixed textiles (2016) 48”x240”
I’d never made a quilt like this before: I sat down and made a miniature version out of construction paper—about the size of a postcard—and then scaled it up for the fabric version. Working that way allowed me to see compositional tensions and balances that I feel I was able to keep in the final version. (Sidenote: the quilt is named in honor of my favorite PBS Newshour host, Judy Woodruff.)
Bolt fabric (2014) 48”x70”
I made this quilt before I ever lived on Cortelyou Road. Maybe it was prophetic. All I knew of Cortelyou was the flashes of turn-of-the-century Victorian homes as the subway rattled down the Q line. It was one of my first hand-tied quilts as well. I love the sense of nostalgia and warmth those ties conjure.
Repurposed men’s dress shirts (2014) 65” x 80”