​After seeing each winner’s work at Quilt Canada 2025, we asked how they take a quilt from good to great. In this case, Judy Garden’s Maze of Vines and Roses won top honours in the traditional quilt category.

​Inspiration for a quilt can come from many sources: floor tiles, wallpaper, stained glass windows or a floral bouquet. On a visit to Charleston, South Carolina in 2003, I noticed an intricately carved vine on the stone step of our boutique hotel. One morning, we went to an art shop for tracing paper and a few conte sticks for a rubbing.

Once home again, other projects took over. I was in the middle of stitching the quilt Deft Delft which would eventually become known as the Dutch Treat quilt. Once that was done I turned my attention to another quilt called Camelot. Meanwhile, my rubbing of the stone step languished in my potential projects drawer for years.

A move back to Canada had me reorganize many things, including my ‘potential projects’ drawer. I unrolled the rubbing of the stone step and knew that I wanted to work on that next. My studio was much smaller than the one left behind in Connecticut but I still retained my potential projects drawer.

In our new home in Prince Edward County, I finished Camelot and joined a guild. Soon afterward, I joined the program committee, which naturally led to creating quilts other than the one in the drawer.

Inspiration beyond quilting

My quilting life took a pause when I went back to school. I spent nine months in Ottawa at Cordon Bleu learning to become a pastry chef, a long-time dream. I started a new business making wedding cakes, so quilting became less of a focus.

Another move, to Cobourg this time, and opening a small pastry shop, took my creativity in another direction. For three years I lived and breathed baking and designing cakes for beautiful brides. But running a shop on my own left me little time for family. Grandchildren would visit and I’d be in the shop.

Then an opportunity came to transfer my lease to a friend for her beauty salon. I had loved every minute in my pastry shop but knew that I was ready to retire.

Quilting became once again my creative outlet. We took out a wall between two bedrooms and transferred my studio from the basement to the second floor. Once again, I unrolled the slightly smudged stone step rubbing. This time I pinned it to the top of my design wall. I decided that the ‘out of sight, out of mind’ mentality was never going to help me create that quilt. That rubbing lived on my design wall for four years!

Finding the right fabrics

In 2018, my sister and I took a trip together to the Netherlands. Other than visiting family and Keukenhof, we had two goals in mind. Sylvia sought out a shop that sold recorders, while I headed for a quilt store in Utrecht.

My friends know me as a lover of blue and white so I was of course, drawn to the blue section. I found a range of fabrics that intrigued me; roses, leaves and vines. But it wasn’t until I saw the same version in red and white that the tingle of inspiration hit me.

Starts and stops

That design joined the rubbing on the design wall and I started to audition the flowers to go on the vines. However, I couldn’t find a red for the vines and leaves that came close to matching the red of the fabric. I flipped over the fabric with the small roses and discovered it was the perfect match. It doesn’t always work, but in this case I lucked out.

This now was my project. I took it to my stitching groups and worked on it in front of the TV or while sitting outside on the patio. My cutting table was strewn with bits of red and white fabric. This project did not use fabric efficiently, since fussy cutting the roses left gaping holes in it.

I completed the top border within a few months and pinned it to the top of my design wall. And then? Nothing.

When I design a quilt, I always start in the middle with a medallion or a pieced centre, then design the borders. Not with this one. Having finished the border, I couldn’t come up with a centre design for the life of me. So, the finished border hung there, decorating my studio for yet more years.

Back on track

Finally, a question from my sister about the status of that quilt prompted me to finally get on with it. I created about four different versions of the centre medallion. The hand-pieced circle and the little intertwined vines with the leaves on top remained constant. I made the centre medallion, only to realize it didn’t work either.

Next, I meticulously cut it out from the back, leaving a hole for which I would have to design another middle. One would think that this whole drawn out process would annoy or frustrate me. However, I also knew that if I wasn’t happy with any of it, I would never finish it.

​Once the centre design fell into place, the rest came easily and it once again became a labour of love. Hand appliqué for me is a soothing process. As each flower and leaf was cut and placed on the quilt, I could see my vision becoming a reality.

The quilt top was finally completed in March 2024, then came the decision on how to quilt it. Quilt patterns that say, “quilt as desired” have always frustrated me. In this case, I “desired” lots of feathers and different stitches to complement each section.

The final challenge

After I finally finished it, due to much handling and marking, it needed a good washing. The dread with using red fabric is always, “Will it run?” Having washed all the fabric beforehand, I trusted it being colourfast and didn’t worry about putting it in the machine. (I can almost hear the gasps of horror. The washing machine? Remember, these durable cotton fabrics have been washed and all the elements are securely attached. A front loader doesn’t twist like agitators in tub machines.)

What a disappointment, when I pulled the quilt out of the machine, to see brownish-reddish tinting on the white fabric. After commiserating with my stitching group, we decided the red embroidery floss I used on the individual flowers had run. They suggested washing it again with blue Dawn as the detergent. Lo and behold, I now had a pristine white background on my red-and-white quilt.

A Maze of Vines and Roses now hangs in my living room. Every now and then, I look at it and think about the journey it took to get there.

I felt extremely honoured to have it win a first place at Quilt Canada. The ribbon hangs in my studio, a reminder that inspiration usually does translate to a beautiful quilt.