American Country 12

Every year Masako designs fabric and its line is called "American Country". It has been 12 years since she began so this year's collection will be American Country 12.

Please enjoy!

30476-20  1100yen/m

30476-30  1100yen/m

30476-31  1100yen/m

30476-70  1100yen/m

30476-71  1100yen/m

30476-72  1100yen/m

30477-10  1100yen/m

30477-20  1100yen

30477-21  1100yen/m

30477-30  1100yen/m

30477-70  1100yen/m

30477-71  1100yen/m

30478-10  1100yen/m

30478-20  1100yen/m

30478-70  1100yen/m

30472-02  1300yen/m

30472-01  1300yen/m

30472-03  1300yen/m

30472-04  1300yen/m

30473-01  1300yen/m

30473-02  1300yen/m

30473-03  1300yen/m

30474-01  1300yen/m

30474-02  1300yen/m

30474-03  1300yen/m

30475-01  1300yen/m

30475-02  1300yen/m



30479  (1 panel is 60cm and one column is 10cm )  1300yen/m 



Trip to Luxembourg and Paris

To see our lovely friends, Catarina living in Luxembourg , Claire and the knitting girls from "Crocheton pour le Japon" living in Paris we flew to Paris at midnight on Saturday May 12th.


On the first day we took a train to get to Metz in France where we were supposed to meet up with Catarina.
Looking out of a window at the platform, we saw the "Orient-Express". We could not see the inside of the train, but we found some lamp shades, wooden doors and great couches which gave us extremely luxurious feeling. We wondered if we could have had a chance to get it on at least once in our life!

On the other hand this was our train ... Again .. Masako was sewing!

At Metz station we safely found Catarina who came to pick us up and walked to where she had parked her car, then one lady got out of the car. Can you guess who that was?

That was Yoko from Ishinomaki! She will have brushed up on her English in Wimbledon by the end of May. She had told us if she had had a chance, she would have visited Luxembourgh during her 2-month-stay in the UK, so we emailed her some days before we were off. She didn't tell us anything about it.
It was a white lie :-)))
Anyway it was a nice surprise. Thank you, Catarina and Yoko!






The following day we went to a Bio restaurant in Luxembourg city which two sisters ran.

A plate with fresh vegetables! There were no words. 


We could stay in Vianden which was her town only for 2 days but we had a wonderful time.


On Tuesday morning (15th) we we went back to Paris with TGV.
As soon as we arrived at Gare de l'est station we grabbed a cab and left our suitcases at our hotel which we always use then headed to a cafe called L'OisiveThé (website) where we met up with Claire.

It was not just a usual cafe. It was a yarn shop as well! We had wonderful plates which came with lots of vegetables and mouillette surrounded by rare wool yarns that we had never seen in Japan.




mouillette

There are several systems of letters and/or numbers that describe the sizing of crochet hooks. In Japan we use numbers from 1 to 10 but one in Europe was written like this.
How interesting!

  
  


Shops in Paris


Bonton
They had adorable clothes for kids. Even if you didn't have a child, it would be worth checking it as they had wonderful crafts as well.

la droguerie
Yes we have their shops in Japan, but we wanted to go to the real one!

L'Homme Bleu
We found this amazing Moroccan restaurant last time we were in Paris for the show called L'aiguille en fete. No reasons not to go back there again!

Hotel
We liked our hotel very much which didn't look fancy at all but was homy, hospitable and cozy.

On Tuesday night we had a party with Claire and the girls at Claire's. We started with some cocktails (Kir Royal) and nibbles. Look at this cute bottle tab which one of the girls, Nadia made. Cassis with a ladybug. How special!

When the party was close to the end, Nadia and Michelle stood up and out of the blue started singing. Then maybe (because we didn't understand what they were singing, even a single word!) at the main part, all of them folded each arm and also started singing!
It was so much fun. We promised to see each other again soon.

Students' works

Until last year we had had our exhibition at the Tokyu department store every other year for the past 10 years, but we decided to do it every year.

As it was hard to make a quilt as big as a bed coverlet in a year, as a new twist, we made mini quilts in wooden frames.

The size of the frames were 36x36cm. They could put little things between the glass and the quilt on the carton board.

It is a shame that I can not share all the works with you but please enjoy some!  

The pieces didn't have to be quilts so there were various ones with embroidery, Punchneedle and cross-stitch.

Not only framed quilts but bed coverlet quilts that students in the Osaka school made were also exhibited.

Magic Patch

When Masako was invited to exhibit her quilt coverlets by L'aiguille en fete last February, an editor of "Magic Patch" from the Saxe Publishing Company had an interview with Masako about how she had started quitling and what had made her feel like doing patchwork.

←

Please note that one of Masako's books will be published in French this August and the Japanese verison is no longer available!

Next to 3 pages of Masako's interview, there was an article of "Patch for Japan" as well!

Annual exhibition at the Tokyu department store in Shibuya

We had our annual exhibition at the Tokyu department store in Shibuya from the 26th of April to the 1st of May.

The ad flag was waving outside the building.

We exhibited some of Masako's old works on the passage to the entrance.

This was the entrance. Welcome!

Then stepping to the right you would find quilts and blankets of "Patch for Japan" (Anata to Watashi no Quilt), and the 25th anniversary quilt.

This wreath was made by Ms. Yoshimoto who was a dried flower arrangement artist and a friend of Masako's. Look at the cute cookies! They were gifts from Masako's students to celebrate the 25th anniversary!

Visitors could see Masako's latest quilt which was first displayed at the Tokyo Dome Show this January and some other works using her latest fabric collection called "American Country 12".

During the exhibition Masako gave a talk at 2pm everyday but the first day.