In the beautiful Sonoran desert Arizona, the Tucson Quilters Guild celebrated their 50th anniversary with a spectacular show. The Quilt Fiesta includes a fascinating mix of styles, techniques, and patterns. We hope you enjoy our photos! This is Part 1 of 5.
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My Turtle from Tula's 100 Blocks, made and quilted by Penny Boese.
Winner of a Judge's Choice award, this fantastic batik quilt was based on Tula Pink's City Sampler: 100 Modern Quilt Blocks, arranged in a unique setting by Penny Boese. She wanted to take Tula's 100 blocks in a different direction and settled on her favorite sea animal, using EQ8 to design the layout.
Westerlund 2 Stellar Nursery, made and quilted by Janet Hasson.
Winner of a blue ribbon for 1st Place in the Viewers Choice category, this stunning original quilt by Janet Hasson is composed of 1600 1-1/2" paper pieced squares using a watercolor technique. The appearance of glittering stars is created by thousands of beads and pearls sewn on top of the squares.
The inspiration for Janet's design was a photograph released by NASA celebrating the Hubble Space Telescope's 25th anniversary in 2015 (NASA photo below):
As NASA describes it, the brilliant tapestry of young stars flaring to
life resemble a glittering fireworks display. The sparkling centerpiece of this
fireworks show is a giant cluster of thousands of stars called
Westerlund 2.
In the quilt by Janet Hasson, subtle gradations of color suggest the swirling gas clouds in Westerlund 2. The beads represent the young super bright massive stars approximately 20,000 light years away.
Carmen Romantica by Barb Lambrecht
The quilt show included a special display of original works by local art quilters. We love Carmen Romantica by Barb Lambrecht. It was inspired by a 1973 greeting card that looked much like Carmen Miranda. This piece is hand appliqued and embellished with paint and a piece of recycled, hand dyed lace.
Through the Stained Glass by JT Taylor, quilted by Kris Neifeld.
The gorgeous colors and stained glass effect of this quilt really drew us in. Winner of a blue ribbon for 1st Place in the Two Person- Medium Pieced category, plus a special award for Best Use of Color, JT Taylor says she collected fabrics for this quilt for about a year in hopes of making a sunset and stained glass quilt. The pattern source was "Striped Surprise" by 3 Dudes Quilting Designs.
Image credits: Photos were taken by Quilt Inspiration at the 2026 Tucson Quilters Guild show. NOTE: Quilt inspiration is an Amazon Associate, meaning that Amazon pays us a small commission if you purchase an item from a link on this page; there is no extra cost to you. Thank you for your support of Quilt Inspiration, and for reading our blog!
