City of Sedona Arizona Centennial quilt
Sedona AZ (May 5, 2013) – Having wrapped up a popular year-long tour to critical acclaim, the Sedona Centennial Quilt will be warmly welcomed to its permanent home, the Sedona Heritage Museum on May 20, 2013, at one o’clock in the afternoon, during National Preservation Month.
The public is invited.
Old fans, new fans and potential fans of all ages are invited to the Jordan Historical Park museum, 735 Jordan Road, for a brief ceremony, when Brynn Unger, chairman of the City of Sedona’s Historic Preservation Commission, will present this unique work of art to the Sedona Historical Society. Forever after, the Society’s museum will treat the quilt like the family jewel it is.
Immediate plans call for the quilt to be showcased in an exhibit drawn from the pioneering Jordan family’s wardrobe.
The more than two dozen gifted and generous quilters, who created this large fabric portrait of Sedona Schnebly (holding a basket of apples) and the region’s gloriously varied landscape and landmarks, will be invited to take a bow during the presentation ceremony. They contributed their award-winning talent to craft this quilt as a special community gift marking Arizona’s Centennial.
Helen Snyder proposed this legacy project to the Historic Preservation Commission in 2010. City staff then approached the Red Rock Quilting Guild and Patsy Krause, owner of the Quilters’ Store in Sedona, to gauge interest. The rest, as we now see in splendid color and form, is history.
Karin Scanlon, the primary artistic designer, started sketching ideas on paper in early 2011. Lorrie Petersen, Patsy Kittredge, and Eunice Hill contributed to the design and were members of the construction team. Once consensus was reached on the design, guild members held a series of quilting bees in their homes during the first half of 2011.
Like generations of women before them, the quilters eagerly contributed hundreds of hours to this project, finishing the quilt months ahead of schedule. Some of the women hand-dyed fabric with Sedona soil and other traditional dyes; others made countless, impossibly tiny stitches to piece the quilt together. Linda Ward prepared the fabric javalina for more local flavor;. Becky Dreher painted Sedona Schnebly’s face and Leigh Shafer stitched the word “Sedona.” The fabric used for Sedona’s blouse and skirt came from a bag of remnants that belonged to the Jordan family who donated the bundle along with many family garments to the museum. The Quilters Store donated backing material and batting; the City of Sedona provided funds for additional fabric.
The Sedona Centennial Quilt is making its second appearance at the Sedona Heritage Museum, displayed first during spring 2012 for the Arizona Centennial. In addition to local showings, the quilt also made a splash at the 2012 Arizona State Quilters Guild Show in Phoenix.
Ann Jarmusch, writer of this SedonaEye.com article, is a member of the Sedona Historic Preservation Commission.
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Sedona Heritage Museum Participates in Blue Star Museum Program –
The Sedona Heritage Museum is proud to announce that it will once again participate in the Blue Star Museums program that offers free admission to museums for all active duty military personnel and their families from Memorial Day May 27, through Labor Day September 2, 2013.
This free admission program is available to active military and their immediate family members.
Blue Star Museums was started as a partnership among Blue Star Families, the National Endowment for the Arts, and now more than 1000 museums across America that offer free admission to families with a parent or spouse serving during this time of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq, especially focusing on the approximately 1 million children who have had at least one parent deployed.
This program offers these families a chance to visit museums this summer when many will have limited resources and limited time to be together.
To learn more about Blue Star Families and who is eligible, visit http://www.BlueStarFam.org.
The Sedona Heritage Museum is located at 735 Jordan Road in Jordan Historical Park in Uptown Sedona and is open daily from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. For more information, call 928-282-7038.