Mary (not Marianne) Fons + THE QUILT

August 7, 1979, the day after my middle child—Mary Katherine Fons—was born, was Entry Day for textiles at the Iowa State Fair. My quilting friends drove my quilts to Des Moines, as Mary and I were busy bonding at Madison County Memorial Hospital. (My first full-size quilt, Lemon Baskets, won a blue ribbon in that year’s textile competition.)

Mary and me in costume at the Madison County Covered Bridge Festival around 1980—costumes by me. All fabrics 100% cotton.

My kids grew up around quilts, but pursued their own creative interests. Quilts and quilting, after all, were my business, not my hobby.

Mary surprised me by turning to patchwork in her early thirties. Life had dealt harsh blows, and sewing became her therapy. A couple of years later, when my longtime co-host Liz Porter retired, Mary (who majored in Theater Arts at the University of Iowa) was persuaded to join me on public television. As a quilter, she was still a beginner, but the cameras loved her. Soon, fans did, too.

Here we are at the ever-popular Tip Table on the set of Fons & Porter’s Love of Quilting at IPTV—now IOWA PBS. We used the three-minute tip segment to make each episode the perfect length for public television nationwide.

“I learned to quilt on national television,” Mary once quipped. “I don’t recommend it.” During the years we co-hosted Fons & Porter’s Love of Quilting, I watched Mary evolve into a skilled quiltmaker and become an outstanding designer. As I’ve often remarked, “I’m creative—Mary Fons is original.”

On her own, Mary launched “Quilty,” an online video series custom made for her generation—kids for whom keyboarding had replaced Home Ec in middle school. Mary knew nesting 30-somethings needed coziness in their apartments and first homes. “You can’t wrap a baby in an iPad,” she said. Via the Internet (her age group’s go-to place to learn everything), she taught them how to thread a sewing machine and the basics of making and appreciating quilts. She also created an adorable magazine called Quilty. (You might be able find old issues on Ebay.)

Quilty magazine, a Fons & Porter publication, was conceived, created, and edited by Mary Fons. She filled the pages with quilting projects that appealed to a younger generation of makers who call themselves sewists.

Writing about quilts gradually outpaced making them, and Mary was for several years editor-in-chief of Quiltfolk magazine. Along the way, she earned an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC).

Next, the history of quilting overtook other quilty aspects of Mary’s life. She massaged that muscle by live-streaming deep dives into the obscure corners of quilts and quiltmakers past and present on Twitch episodes called Quilt Nerd.

Quilt Nerd followers loved Mary’s live-streamed sessions because she and the audience explored quilt history together in real time.

Mary and her husband Eric recently (temporarily) relocated from Chicago to Austin to be in place for Mary’s three-year doctoral program. Her Phd from the University of Texas will be in American Studies, her area of emphasis: The Quilt.

Mary was accepted into four PhD programs, including George Washington University, Boston University, Bryn Mawr, and the University of Texas, Austin. Photo by Joe Mazza.