Featured Designer: Meet Amy!

Hello fellow quilt/fabric lovers! I’m Amy Smart and I am a fabriholic. And a quilter. I come from a line of makers and sewers (sewists?) so I think this quilting thing is in my DNA. I first learned to sew and piece a quilt from my mom. I loved creating with her fabric and feel very grateful that she was so patient with me using (and abusing) her sewing machine as well as cutting into her fabric stash. (I guess I inherited that trait from her too as I now have my own stash.)

It wasn’t until I had my first baby 23 years ago that I really started making quilts with a vengeance. It was the best creative outlet during my years of mothering 4 young children. So much of mothering is daily repetitive tasks that need to be redone each day. (What? You want to eat again? We just did that yesterday!) It was so cathartic for me during those years to have something that stayed done - or at least when I could see the visible progress, even if it was just a little at a time. (Now that my kids are almost adults, I’m seeing the visible progress of those efforts too.)

 During those years I also worked Saturday afternoons in my local quilt shop. It was so delightful to get out and talk to other quilters and pet fabric. And they even paid me to do it! During that time I started designing quilt patterns for the shop, teaching beginning quilting classes and along the way learned a lot about the quilting industry.

 In 2008 I started writing about my projects on a blog, Diary of a Quilter and have been sharing ever since. I never dreamed where this journey would take me. I’ve since published numerous patterns, contributed to books and magazines and authored a book, Fabulously Fast Quilts. You can find my latest patterns in my Pattern Shop. You can also find me on Facebook and Instagram.

 In 2017 I released my first fabric collection with Riley Blake Designs and I love to draw on life experiences as my inspiration. My 6th collection will come out at the beginning of 2023.

In the middle of all of that I’ve been living in Utah with my husband where we’ve raised our 4 kids. We love to travel abroad as well as explore the mountains and national parks close to home.