About

Tacha Bruecher

As a kid Tacha dabbled in all sorts of crafts. She spent many happy hours in her Grandma's pottery, used to send all her relatives hand made bead necklaces and sticky home baked sweeties for Christmas every year whether they liked it or not and made clothes for her dollies. But she only discovered her love for fabric when she moved to North Carolina and stumbled across one of the most amazing fabric stores she has ever been in. She decided then and there to make a Memory Quilt for her grandfather's 75th birthday despite the fact she had never made a quilt before. Tacha spent hours hand piecing the quilt and true love was found. Since that moment in time it is rare to find Tacha without yarn, thread or fabric in her hand or about her person! The birth of Tacha's two daughters just increased her need to sew, sew, sew and sew. Changing bags, cot quilts, stuffies, bibs and the list goes on. Her addiction was made worse when she discovered the online quilting community. Tacha now participates in 8 online bees and in the regular swaps held on flickr. Not content to ever do one thing at a time, Tacha also enjoys screenprinting and carving stamps to use on fabric. She would love one day to design her own fabric line.

John Adams

We all know that guys like their power tools. But for John Adams, his power tool of choice is a bit unusual. It's his sewing machine. As one of a handful of male quilters active in the online community, John (also known as Quilt Dad to his blog readers) had become known for his modern aesthetic, his inspired fabric and color combinations, his willingness to push his own boundaries, and his high-quality craftsmanship. John always had a creative spirit. While his friends were playing little league on Saturday mornings, John could be found in painting, cartooning, pottery or music classes. After college he followed a more traditional corporate career path, ultimately earning his MBA degree. But John never lost touch with his creative side. In 2004 John's wife left the work force to be a stay-at-home mom for their newborn twins and decided to learn to sew. The family invested in a sewing machine, and John soon found himself drawn to the many designer fabrics that his wife was purchasing to make bags and purses. He asked her to show him the basics of how to work the sewing machine, and a new passion was born. In 2008 John discovered the vibrant online communities of quilters and crafters via blogs, About.com, Craftster and, ultimately, Flickr (where he has been most active in swaps and quilting groups). That is when he decided to start his now-popular blog, QuiltDad.com. John credits the many swaps he completed for enabling him to rapidly learn and advance his quilting and sewing skills. He has since moved into pattern design and is a contributor to the Moda Bake Shop (www.modabakeshop.com). John is thrilled to be part of the Fat Quarterly family and can't wait to share his inspiration and ideas with its readers. John lives in Cary, North Carolina with his wife, 5 year-old twin daughters and 4 year-old son. He works in branding and marketing for a major global software company.

Lynne Goldsworthy

Lynne has been sewing ever since she was little, making a colossal mess on the dining room floor and driving her mother mad, leaving scraps of fabric and thread trailing around the house. She then grew up and got a proper job as a lawyer in the 1980s, the great era of court shoes, big hair and shoulder pads. On a series of business trips to Washington, she had some spare time before the flights home and spent that time in Tysons Corner, a colossal American shopping mall. It was then that she fell in love with Americana, shops full of wooden Shaker boxes, baskets full of cinnamon sticks, faded paintings of the US flag and American quilts. She came back home from those business trips and scoured the UK for quilt shops. At the time they were few and far between and what there were didn't really seem to carry many fabrics that really appealed to her. So she made a couple of really quite ugly quilts and lost interest pretty quickly. Fifteen years and four children later, she moved with her family from London to a tiny little village in the middle of nowhere slap bang in the middle of England, a move that would prove to be a turning point in her life. After school one day, her daughters went to play at a friend's house. When Lynne went to pick them up, the mother, Mandy, was sitting at her kitchen table, in front of a sewing machine, making a quilt. Mandy showed Lynne the modern quilts she had made, her sampler made of Japanese fabrics, her blog and her stash of modern fabrics. Lynne's interest in quilting was immediately re-kindled but this time around there were blogs, Flickr, online shops, modern fabrics, modern quilts and a whole community out there of people full of ideas, inspiration and advice. She ordered a layer cake and a jelly roll, made a couple of quilts, started a blog, joined Flickr, joined some swaps, started a couple of bees and hasn't looked back since. She has four children, two cats and a long-suffering Welsh husband. By a stroke of luck, she doesn't live too far from Katy and Brioni who sometimes drive down the motorway to spend a day or even a weekend at her house. Although they call these days "sewing days", 90% of the time is spent in the garden, drinking coffee and talking about life, the universe and quilting. She is the newest member of the Fat Quarterly team and also the oldest but perhaps that means she is also the wisest.