Sunshine Coast Bulletin - Australia

Quilting has long been a tradition in Australia, and June Lynn is keeping the craft alive with her business on the Sunshine Coast. 

Stepping into the three rooms below June's house is entering a world of colour, imagination, and skill all combined to create a high art form.

June's first quilt was made with her mother-in-law in 1987 to ease the homesickness of missing a daughter who was in her first term at boarding school.

On the floor of June's workrooms are hundreds of four-inch squares of fabric laid out for a new quilt. 

June sits on the edge of the bed covered with several of her quilts and muses:  "there's something not quite right there".

Only June's eyes can see the disruption in the colours of the design.

Once some of her quilts are finished, June and her husband Ken take it to Queensland Quilters Inc in Brisbane for photographing, registration and valuation for insurance purposes.

June's quilts have been sent all over the world, as far away as South Africa and Europe, as well as many places in Australia and New Zealand.  Her only advertisement is a sign on the nature strip outside her house, which is on a much travelled road in Noosaville on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland.

The sign catches the eye of tourists and locals who stop by to see yet another interesting part of the Noosa area, and often stay to order a quilt or buy one of the samples in the rooms.

A young family of four once spent four hours sitting on the floor putting together a quilt for the new baby.  Many people bring their own fabrics.  June does not  only work with the conventional cotton fabrics that most quilt makers use:  she also incorporates personal items such as part of your wedding dress, a special occasion gown, or baby's first layette into your quilt.

June does not mind if visitors do not buy or order a quilt.  She enjoys talking about colours and patterns with people.  One elderly lady from interstate called in and admired her work.  On her second visit she brought June her heirloom lace for "safe-keeping" because she was moving into an aged care facility.  June was the only person the lady would entrust the quilt to.

A quilt with old photographs printed onto fabric is June's special gift to an elderly relative.  A wartime wedding photograph takes pride of place in the quilt, surrounded by enlarged black and white snapshots of special moments of the relative's life "down on the farm".

June's introduction to quilting is an example of an Australian Outback tradition. June comes from a rural background in South Australia and her earliest memory of quilt making is when her mother "put a quilt together with an old army blanket and a curtain for backing."

The earliest quilts in Australia came from many sources, two of which are from convict women being transported to Australia and also itinerant sheep shearers in the Australia outback.

In the mid-19th century sheep shearers sewed together hessian flour sacks with baling string and needles from the shearing sheds.  The sacks usually came from the Wagga Wagga mills with the name stencilled on them, which is probably how they became known as "waggas".

In 1815 English prison reformer Elizabeth Fry formed the Quaker group the British Ladies Society for the Reformation of Female Prisoners. In 1815 they gave convict women bound for Australia on the vessel "Rajah", 10 pounds of fabric scraps, 100 needles and thread to occupy their time on the long journey. 

The quilt, with spots of blood from the convict women's fingers, is in the Australian National Gallery, Canberra.  Because of its fragility, it is shown for a limited time only.

June's business is called "Noosa Quilts".  Her email address is: kenjwlynn@bigpond.com