The next VDTA/SDTA Convention & Show will be in
New Orleans, LA
February 27 - 29, 2012
at the Ernest Morial Convention Center

Quilters without Borders

Piecing together a better future for Mongolian women

2009 update

Quilters without Borders has successfully raised $80,000 and purchased a permanent facility in Ulaanbaatar for the Mongolian Quilting Center. This ground floor apartment has a shop front, classroom and office. It is located on a Seoul Street, opposite the Mongolian Barbeque, just a 10-minute walk from the heart of Ulaanbaatar and easy for the women to reach using public transport. Maggie Ball will be returning to Mongolia in July to visit the new Center, teach and provide support to assist the women in their goal of becoming self-sustaining.

Last time we told you about this project, we were promoting the National Quilt Guilds contest to encourage quilt guilds to donate to help purchase the new community center. Guilds and groups who donated $100 were entered into a drawing and the award was to have Maggie lecture and teach (all expenses covered). Over $4,000 was raised from this contest. In addition, when the Quilt Guild of Dallas heard about it, they invited an application for their annual endowment grant, and the project was awarded the full $5,000 grant. The winning group in the drawing was the women of the United Methodist Church in Appleton, MN, and Maggie visited there in late April this year to teach and lecture as promised. Entrants also sent 6” squares of fabric and Maggie is in the process of piecing these into a quilt to take to Mongolia as a gift celebrating the success of this campaign.

Maggie has been fortunate to have the opportunity to send boxes of donated quilting supplies to Mongolia in containers carrying cars. Each 20” x 20” x 20” box with no weight restriction, costs only $50 to send (less than a sixth of the cost of sending by airmail). Last fall, seven boxes were sent and arrived safely about 2-1/2 months later. Another seven boxes were shipped this April.

For those of you who missed the article a year ago, here is a summary of the project. The New Way Life (NGO) Mongolian Quilting Center in Ulaanbaatar was opened in 2004 under the direction of Selenge Tserendash, a young Mongolian lawyer, for the purpose of helping needy Mongolian women both economically and socially. Quilting is a new activity in Mongolia, but the women have excellent sewing skills and are eager to learn. Even the nomadic families own old hand-cranked Russian sewing machines and have recyclable fabric.

Selenge appealed to quilt teachers in the U.S. to go to Mongolia and provide quilting expertise and assistance. Maggie responded and volunteered with her daughter in 2004. They taught basic quilting skills, and the piecing of the traditional Mongolian ölzii motif thought to bring long-life and prosperity. This motif is featured on aprons, bags and quilts that the women make to sell. Maggie returned to Mongolia in 2006 to help organize the first international quilt show in Mongolia in collaboration with quilters from the UK and Japan. In 2007, Selenge and Maggie joined the UK quilters to host a special exhibit featuring quilts and items made by the Mongolian women at the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham, UK. The Mongolian women have made outstanding progress with their quilting and now make many beautiful items, including complex expansions of the ölzii pattern in silks and pictorial appliqués of Mongolian scenes. The Center now employs two full-time seamstresses making items to sell, and three teachers.

The Quilters without Borders project is supported by St. Barnabas Episcopal Church, Bainbridge Island, WA, which acts as the financial host and to which tax-deductible donations online may be made. Funds from the sale of items made at the Mongolian Quilting Center are used to assist with operating and maintenance costs. Check the Web site www.dragonflyquilts.com for more details and photographs.

Maggie Ball is a quilt teacher and author living in the Seattle area. She may be contacted by e-mail at maggie.quilter@gmail.com.

Reprinted from SQE Professional, July 2009