Herrick

When I helped my friend Berni make a quilt from her late brother's shirts last year, I had no idea I'd be making a similar quilt myself a year later. It's been a long, sad process but I'm pleased that it's finally finished and I can hand the quilt over to the recipient. 

This quilt was made from my beloved Uncle Herrick's shirts and is for his partner - Chris. Herrick died suddenly 18 months ago, which was a terrible shock for the whole family. I offered to make Chris a memory quilt of her own as I knew she'd get a lot of comfort from it, but even so, I had no idea how difficult it was going to be. Chris gave me the shirts at New Year (exactly a year after Herrick's death), but it took me about four months to pluck up the courage to even open the bags. I did open them eventually, and after lots of blubbing I finally started cutting out the squares for his quilt. This was the longest part of the whole process, partly because it was so emotional and I had to keep putting it away, but also because cutting up enough shirts for a sizeable quilt just takes ages. There were a few shirts left over so I made two of them into cushions as a little extra gift for Chris. They were super easy to make - look out for a tutorial on how to make them soon.

The finished quilt is large enough for a double bed and measures around 64" x 74". It's made up of 5" squares from as many different colours as I could find amongst his shirts. I decided to lay out the quilt top as a random design, which was actually quite a departure for me (in case you haven't noticed, I like things to be symmetrical, colour co-ordinated and lined up!) My only rule when laying out the patchwork squares was that no two squares of the same colour should lie next to each other. Sewing up the patchwork top was very straight forward, helped by my favourite new haberdashery purchase - Aurifil quilting thread from M is for Make. This high quality thread is fab - there were fewer instances of snarled up knots when sewing the squares together and it gave a lovely, precise finish to the top stitching.

The backing is just a plain, red cotton sheet (Chris wanted a red quilt back as Herrick was a lifelong Liverpool supporter) and the binding is the same blue and white striped binding I used for my son Charlie's quilt.

The brown square is from Herrick's work satchel - Chris had it personalised with his initials some years ago.

And this little Liverpool badge is from one of his football tops. The top wasn't suitable for using in the quilt but the badge was, so I unpicked it and sewed it onto the quilt back.

For the actual quilting, I sewed ¼" either side of each square, which gives a nice, neat effect on both sides.

I won't say too much about Herrick, as thinking about him still sets me off in floods of tears. He was only 15 years older than me, so was more like an older brother than an uncle and the funniest man I knew. There are so many little things that make me remember him…. I'll remember him whenever I see a terrible zombie film (watching Plan Nine from Outer Space with him was the time I laughed most in my entire life), I'll remember him when I hear the theme tune to Inspector Morse. I'll remember him when I see a copy of Tess of the D'Urbervilles. And I'll especially remember him whenever I hear Fagin's throwaway line in Oliver!, "Shut up and drink your gin." I miss him terribly.

I don't know anything about the individual shirts used in this quilt, they're Chris's memories. All I know is that it was a privilege to piece them together and make such a personal gift. I think its time to hand it over to its rightful owner now.  x