2002 ~ THE STRANGWAYS HALL QUILT

How could we follow the banners and the kneelers ?

The answer was clear as soon as we heard that dry rot had been found in the Strangways Hall. Once the village school, the Hall was the focus for just about every community group in Abbotsbury. Putting it right wouldn't just be expensive, it would leave the village without a meeting place for months on end.

Sue put a letter in the Chesil magazine, asking if anyone was interested in making a quilt to be raffled in aid of Hall repair funds. Abbotsbury being Abbotsbury, the quilt was under way within weeks ~ 42 panels each a foot square, separately quilted and stitched, with only the panel size and colours specified.

All Abbotsbury life is there ~ ammonites on the coast, birds, trees and flowers, village buildings, signposts for the walkers, all hand-stitched on panels individually coloured with transfer paint. And the work didn't finish there ~ the placing of each panel in the design was only the start of the finishing process that included stitching together the 42 panels, edging the quilt and adding a little tie at each intersection.

By the late spring of 2002, the quilt was ready. It went on show (left) at a party at Wheelwrights for the families of the 16 stitchers (right) and the Strangways Hall committee, who had printed 3000 tickets for the raffle ~ and within two or three weeks had to print 3000 more!

By the end of May, every single ticket had been sold, £1200 had been raised for the repair fund, and we all waited for news of the winning ticket. Would the quilt go to a villager ? To one of the visitors who had pledged to donate it to the village ? To the New Zealanders who offered to pay for the postage if they won the quilt ?

None of them ... The winning ticket had been bought (in Wheelwrights!) by a couple from Blandford Forum who are putting it to very good use. The unanimous verdict here was that if the quilt had to leave Abbotsbury, it couldn't go to a better home.