The Designer Associates
- about the artists

Below is a partial listing of some of the prestigious designer associates who mention National Nonwovens’ felt fabrics and products specifically in their magazine and book projects. 

NOTE: Please see our Pattern Partner list for the companies who implement our materials into patterns.

2 Chicks Design, Inc, Jeri Alcoset & Kristine Hastings
Kristine and Jeri met over 25 years ago while working at a local bank. Their passion has always been crafting and stitching. Although time and events have changed, their passion hasn’t changed a bit.  A few years ago Kristine introduced Jeri to a new penny rug “stitching habit” and they were off and running... or rather stitching.  Soon after they decided to create patterns that they could not find.  Today, 2 Chicks Design is having a great time doing what they have always loved to do, stitching and meeting others who share their passion for the needle arts.

Kristine and Jeri have always used National Nonwovens’ felt, long before designing patterns.  The color choices allow them to be creative, while at the same time give their customers the opportunity to create something of their own personality.  They also appreciate the texture and firmness, especially when working on wall-hanging projects.

Contact:  www.2chicksdesign.com 

Sue Allemand
Sue of Palette Primitives has been designing projects for the craft and creative industries for over 17 years.  She is a self-taught artist and is widely known for her folk-art, primitive and whimsical designs.  "I LOVE using WoolFelt® in my projects!  It adds a feeling of warmth and nostalgia that adds "heart" to every design!"  Sue is a monthly contributor to numerous magazines and publications, and has over 200 individual pattern designs available on her website!

Contact: www.paletteprimitives.com 

Debra Arch
Debra’s 40+ years of crafting experience and common sense has given her the expertise to have sold over 50 different crafting tips to various craft magazines over the past 20 years along with over 300 designs. She has eight pattern books, published by DRG Publishing, which exclusively consist of only her designs and is awaiting her 9th pattern book to be published before the end of this year.  Her felt patterns featuring National Nonwovens’ products are regularly featured in major magazines including Create & Decorate and Crafts’n Things.

Contact:  www.e-patternscentral.com , www.freepatterns.com  and www.anniesattic.com.

Madeline Arendt
Madeline is a freelance designer and member of the Society of Creative Designers. Mny of her designs have won top honors.  Madeline enjoys being hired by companies as either a demonstrator, project designer or teacher.  When she is not busy representing companies, she takes time to teach classes at area stores. Her latest accomplishments include the publication of her first book, titled “Altered Art, for the first time™”, published by Sterling/Chapelle and having a table runner project featured in Crafts n’ Things.

Contact: (847) 741-6563 • madelinejean@earthlink.net

Sharon Baum
Sharon Baum has been creating and teaching others since she can remember. She uses all kinds of mediums to create vintage-like rugs, dolls, and seasonal items, with WoolFelt® being her favorite fabric.  Sharon enjoys working with WoolFelt® because of its color, texture, and durability and incorporates it in her penny rugs, tree skirts, tablemats, and hooked rugs that regularly appear in leading craft publications such as Create and Decorate. 

Contact:  660-747-9446 • roseofsharon28@hotmail.com

Heidi Boyd
Heidi is the author of ten books with Northlight most notably the Simply Beautiful Series. She crafts at the dining table where she can keep an eye on the family and dash out the door to make the next carpool. Her goal is to make sophisticated design approachable and easy for all. She has a fine arts degree and got her start in professional crafting as a contributor to Better Homes and Garden books and magazines. Please check out her newest eco friendly title - Craftcycle.  Catch up with her at heidiboyd.blogspot.com/

Melony Bradley
Melony is a full-time craft designer/professional who has been selling finished crafts featuring original designs for 10 years.  With a career background in consumer and business-to-business marketing, she excels in promoting creative products to consumers and inspiring them to purchase craft products.  Her extensive background in trade shows and sales presentations allow her to provide services such as teaching classes and product demonstrations at trade shows.  Melony is currently specializing in Kid’s Crafts, Home Décor, Paper Crafts, Needle Arts and Seasonal Crafts. She has also been published extensively in national craft consumer magazine and other media.

Contact: 901-482-2813 • http://mel-designs.typepad.com/my-blog/    

Marianne Byrne-Goarin, Cinnamon Patch
Marianne Byrne-Goarin, the designer behind The Cinnamon Patch, invites you to travel the seasons with her charming designs mixing patchwork fabrics and National Nonwovens’ WoolFelt® in a pure country style. Mini-quilts, cushions, table runners, wall hangings and other delightful homespun accessories will bring warmth and originality to your home. Her characteristic style is expressed in the much-loved penny rugs, and the original use of appliqué and traditional embroidery stitches that embellish her designs. Her patterns and latest book “Cinnamon Inspirations” are distributed to quilt shops in the US by Brewer.

Born in the US and raised in Ireland, Marianne is now based in France where she set up her cottage industry design company using WoolFelt® exclusively in her seasonal creations. “Working with WoolFelt® is so easy and relaxing and it has an almost therapeutic quality that I would compare to gardening,” says Marianne. “No need to be a ‘seasoned stitcher’ or even for a sewing machine. No fuss when cutting out, no frayed edges and appliqué is a child’s game. Just add a few simple embroidery stitches to personalize and voilà! “

Contact: www.thecinnamonpatch.com.

Amanda Carestio

Amanda has been a serial crafter all her life, but her latest obsessions are stitching projects. For the past year, she’s been dealing with a serious Flickr addiction and a compulsion toward an inordinate amount of online swaps, bees, and groups (go, Modern Quilt Guild. For a fine mix of crafty stuff along with pictures of some of her other passions including her “sweet, yet horribly spoiled” dogs and info on hiking adventures, go to digsandbean.blogspot.com.

Vickie Clontz
Every now and then, we meet a designer that embraces the spirit of innovation that goes into every National Nonwovens’ craft and hobby products.  Vickie Clontz is one of those treasured designers, as proven in the inspiring and original methods in which she manipulates our WoolWisps needle felting products.  She uses a fun technique to turn the rovings into beads that she then turns into a variety of unique beaded jewelry.  You can purchase Vickie’s patterns directly through her online pattern store, Annie’s Keepsakes.

Contact: 704- 279-7714 • www.annieskeepsakes.com

Samantha Cotterill
Samantha lives in Upstate New York with her husband and two young boys. After taking a five-year break from a painting career to have children, Samantha returned to the art world as a self-taught fiber artist. With the launching of mummysam, an online shop featuring her own work, Samantha has been able to create one of a kind sculptures using all natural fibers.

Contact: www.mummysam.com

Susan Cousineau
Like most designers, Susan shared a childhood passion for everything creative, spending endless hours coloring, drawing and designing greeting cards. After receiving a degree in business administration, she launched her own studio and turned her creative passion into a full-time career in product design for the past 20 years!

The Sew Sweet Chic pattern collection is currently licensed with the McCall Pattern Company, with several designs top sellers! Each collection combines cozy textures and playful prints, whimsical motifs, embroidered details and charming trims and embellishments for a distinctive three-dimensional look.  WoolFelt® is incorporated into many of the designs in the new Gifts 'n Giggles pattern collection. Each pattern features a coordinating wall hanging and pillow set (the gifts!) and a fun playtime or dress-up accessory (the giggles!). From sparkly princesses, ballerinas and fairies, to magical unicorns, mermaids and teddy bear tea parties, this delightful collection is what little girls' dreams are made of!

Contact: www.sweetchicdesign.com

Barbara Crawford
Barbara of Crawford Designs, uses her talent to design affordable patterns and kits using old clothing, vintage material, and affordable fabrics, including WoolFelt®.  Her book, The Art of Needle Felting on Wearables, has color photos of 16 designs and patterns such as jackets, sweaters, duster coat, handbags, flat surface and dimensional flowers.  She uses National Nonwovens’ products almost exclusively.  She has also published a second book entitled Needlefelting—Something for Everyone!  

Contact: (816) 413-8506 •  www.crawforddesigns.net

Pamela Curo
Although designer Pamela Curo has a background in art including a BFA in costume design for the theatre, living in remote North Country surroundings in Minnesota has perhaps inspired her the most when she creates a new design.  Many of Pam’s designs have a traditional “lodge look” and will add charm and warmth to any home.  Pam’s new pattern, Cardinal and Blooms, not only was featured on the cover of Quilt Almanac 2008, but is also sold through her pattern company, Cotton Tales. 

Contact: 218-675-5281• www.cottontales.net

Tammy DeYoung
Tammy’s whimsical designs are so popular, you’ll sometimes see them charming you from the cover of today’s most popular publications while you’re standing in the check-out aisle.  To make her characters in her home decorating projects come to life, Tammy often uses a variety of WoolFelt hues… as she did on the holiday pillows that were designed exclusively for Better Homes and Gardens Holiday Craft issues.  To learn more about Tammy’s WoolFelt patterns, please visit our Pattern Partner page

Contact: 214-335-3387 • www.plumcreekcollectibles.com 

Laura Lee Fritz
Laura Lee Fritz is widely known for her hand appliqué quilts and her fanciful wholecloth quilting filled with narrative images from the stories surrounding her life which includes raising bluetick hounds and Navajo-Icelandic sheep in rural Montana. Laura is a well-known long arm quilter and her book, 250 Continuous Line Quilting Designs published by C&T, sold out immediately after its release and is now into the second printing.  Her encore book, 250 MORE Continuous-line Quilting Designs, is newly released and is also a hot seller.  WoolFelt® is featured in many of Laura's books, including her new book, Mindful Meandering and its chaser, Creative Classics. 

Contact:  707-987-4870 • www.lauraleefritz.com

Barri Gaudet
Barri lives in June Lake, CA, which is scenically located in the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range, with her husband Ron, dog "Flip" and two kitties. She enjoys the picturesque beauty, walks, and kayaking in the lakes. If you happen to drive by her house you will see many colors drying in the breeze.

To the delight of her many loyal and enthusiastic customers, Barri keeps very busy creating new designs for her Bareroots Pattern Company. Barri especially loves working with small appliqué and WoolFelt® is perfect for this. She has introduced over 20 popular WoolFelt® candle mat patterns with multiple themes for every season. 

Contact:  https://bareroots.com

Karina Hittle
The work of Karina Hittle, founder of the design studio Artful Offerings, specializes in the creation of craft, quilting & stitchery "pattern from folk art to fancy"™.   She has been featured in Fons and Porter's Love of Quilting, Create and Decorate™, and Better Homes and Gardens Holiday Crafts magazines, among many others.  Her goal is to create an artful and memorable experience for her customers, which evokes an element of excitement and surprise, from the moment they first see her patterns thru the entire creative process!  Karina, along with her husband Audie, is also one of our VIP Pattern Partners. 

Contact: 978- 846-1632 •  www.artfulofferings.com

Sue Marsh
Sue’s goal is to make you giggle with her whimsical Whistlepig Creek Productions patterns.  Her signature animals have become so popular that some of her contagious characters are now on fabric designs. You’ll still find her famous critters on a fun, heartwarming collection of patterns from bunnies and bears to kitties and puppies. Whistlepig has produced many wonderful pattern books and magazine projects throughout the years.

Contact: 303-420-4613 • www.wpcreek.com

Lorine Mason
Lorine is the author of seven books, a free-lance project designer and an editor whose work can be found in-print, on-line and through television programming. An eye for detail, innovative project design, trend awareness and hard work are the corner stones of her business, Lorine Mason Designs. Her success is due in part to her extensive background in retail where she has held positions in management, education, marketing and merchandising. Coming in 2011, licensed children’s craft project kits designed by Lorine. 

Contact: www.lorinemasondesign.com • Blog http://lorinemason.blogspot.com

Rebekah Meier
For over a decade Rebekah has professionally established herself as an author, designer and artist in both the craft and quilt industries.  Her designs have been featured in numerous publications, and she writes columns in both Create and Decorate and Crafts'n Things magazines.  With a love of fiber and collage she has combined both together creating Fabric Art Collage 40+ Mixed Media Techniques.  Her inspiration comes from urban architecture and geometric design.  In her free time she likes to experiment with new mixed media techniques, incorporating them into collage and art quilts.

Contact: www.rebekahmeier.net •  www.rebekahmeier.net/Blog.html

Cathy Pendleton
Cathy creates some of Indygo Junctions most popular patterns, kits, and project books.   She began her business when she stayed home with her newborn son, but still needed an income.  In her words, “necessity became the mother of invention” and she decided to take her family and friends’ advice to sell her homemade gifts.   Since then, Cathy branched out to design home décor, clothing, and soft sculpture collectibles.  Her favorite fabric… WoolFelt®!  She loves how WoolFelt® holds its shape and how wonderfully appliqués. 

Contact:  913-341-5559 • www.cheswickcompany.com

Debra Quartermain
Sewing has been a life-long passion for Debra.  Although Debra has been a pattern business owner and Butterick designer, she has reinvented herself and now mostly designs sewing and craft projects for magazines and books.  Her favorite areas of design are wearables and home décor, especially needle felting projects.  Debra is promoting her needle felting techniques through teaching with wool rovings from National Nonwovens and STYROFOAM™ brand products from Dow Chemical.  Several of her designs have been recently highlighted in Crafts'n Things. “I love needle felting and am addicted to it at the moment,” says Debra. “There’s so much potential for design and one of my favorite mediums is WoolFelt®.” 

Contact: www.debraquartermain.com • www.debraquartermain.com/ceoblog

Phyllis Sandford
Phyllis, owner of Totally Tole, has her hands into a number of different mediums, needle felting, felting, crocheting and knitting.   She has been a freelance designer and author for the last 20 years and has published a number of magazine articles and books.. Phyllis has a wide range of teaching experience which includes everything from trade show seminars to teaching her 10 grandchildren crafts.  She has fun doing it all and also designing project sheets and “make-it take-its”.

Contact: 845-831-3935 • Totaltole@aol.com

Faye Wagner Schilling
Faye began sewing with her grandmothers at a very young age. She has always been creative and enjoys putting her own personal touch into everything she makes. Faye has been an avid quilter for over 30 years and began rug hooking in early 1995. This passion almost immediately led to teaching and designing rug hooking patterns for her Cabin Creek Design company. She soon started designing wool appliqué patterns. Faye is also a regular contributor to the publications Create & Decorate and Christmas 365.  She uses WoolFelt® for many of her projects. “WoolFelt® is so easy to work with,” says Faye. “It doesn’t fray, it has a nice appearance and it photographs very well. It also cuts easily and holds its shape nicely.”

Contact: 651-459-9684 •   www.cabincreekdesigns.com

Keri Lee Sereika

Keri, currently living in South Carolina, is a stay-at-home mother of four and wife to a USAFR pilot.  Keri has been on a number of manufacturer's design teams, has authored many articles in a variety of magazines and online media, and has had her designs featured in numerous magazines and books. When not busy playing with her kids or trying to keep her house clean, Keri can be found up in her studio crafting or on the computer researching or writing articles on crafting.

Keri likes National Nonwovens’ felt products for many reasons. “I have never used a felt that is so easy to work with, has such a nice firm feel and still cuts easily using whatever type of cutting tool I choose to work with,” says Keri.  “The felt holds its shape wonderfully and I am able to cut even very fine detail and it still holds up well.”

Contact: www.pinklemonade.typepad.com

Jan Speed
Although Jan has come from a long line of fabulous quilters, drawing and painting have always been more of a passion for her. Jan uses her talent to design many stunning WoolFelt patterns for her A Piece of Work Pattern Company. Several of her designs have also been featured in Fons and Porters “Love of Quilting” magazine. 

Contact: 318-354-9591 • www.apieceofworkdesigns.com

 

Mary Stori
Mary is an internationally recognized quiltmaker, author, fashion designer, instructor, lecturer, and quilt show judge. She was awarded 2004 Teacher of the Year by The Professional Quilter. Mary has written extensively, and her award-winning work has appeared in scores of quilt magazines and publications, and has been widely exhibited nationally and internationally. She has appeared on HGTV's Simply Quilts, Sew Perfect, and Fon's & Porter's Love of Quilting. She designed the Mary Stori Collection for Kona Bay Fabrics, as well as her own line of stencils for Quilting Creations.

Her newest book is "Embellishing With Felted Wool features 16 delightful WoolFelt® decorative projects small enough to take with you and work on anywhere. “I love the process of beading on fabric, so I'm always looking for new and faster ways to start that process,” says Mary. “That might explain my attraction to WoolFelt®. Part of its appeal is that it is soft and cozy, but I especially like working with felted wool because it’s not necessary to turn under the edges for appliqué. Best of all, this material is a perfect backdrop for beads and buttons that contribute to the design by adding color, texture, and sparkle.”

Contact:  www.marystori.com • www.marystori.blogspot.com/

Janet Wagner
Janet has the honor to be included in the distinguished group of 200 American craftsmen who comprise the juried Directory of Traditional American Crafts® published by Early American Life Magazine.  Her interest in American folk art design stems from a lifelong study of American decorative arts, antiques, and textiles.  Featured in the June issue of Early American Life Magazine, Janet’s Spring Chickens Penny Rug is a reproduction of a wool table rug made in 1850 using WoolFelt®.  Traditional penny rugs were made with scraps of wool and wool felt and were stitched using appliqué and embroidery techniques. Janet used the colors of the original rug by implementing various WoolFelt® colors. Janet sells her designs through her pattern company, A Slice of Heritage.

Contact: 585-467-1229 • www.asliceofheritage.com

Kathy Wegner

Along with numerous magazine and book projects, Kathy Wegner's 550+ designs have been seen on manufacturer websites and project sheets, in kits, iron-on transfers and display samples. Kathy enjoys utilizing a wide variety of arts and crafts supplies in her creations. Trying new product combinations provides an exciting challenge. Equally at ease creating children's craft projects or altered art, Kathy's designs can be classic and elegant or bright and simple, detailed or streamlined. Kathy uses WoolFelt^® and National Nonwovens Needlefelting products in her designs.

Contact: (970) 669-3378 • kat2kraft@yahoo.com

Elissa and Heather Willms
Heather and Elissa Willms are a mother-daughter design team and owners of Hopscotch Quilt Shop in Coaldale, Alberta.  Elissa began the shop when she was 15 years old, balancing the running a part-time business and school by taking her classes online.

All of Heather and Elissa’s designs are created in their two favorite color ways. Heather prefers dark, country colors, while Elissa loves to work with brights.  They have created to books that were published through Martingale called “Christmas Quilts From Hopscotch” and, “Double Take.” They have developed a pattern line that reflects their dark/bright tastes and their patterns are as diverse as their color palettes and include quilts, bags, and pincushions.  Speaking of diversity, that one of the reasons they like National Nonwovens’ products.  They are impressed by the range of colors and the wool content options, and especially appreciate the price-point on the WCF001 80/20 rayon and wool blend.

Contact:  www.hopscotchquiltshop.com  •  403-345-3910

Linda Wyszynski
Linda - owner of Hearthside Creations LLC - is a freelance needlework designer, teacher, canvas painter and consultant. She had been designing professionally for over 20 years and has contributed needlework designs to numerous hardcover books & craft magazines. Linda creates designs in appliqué, bead embroidery, cross-stitch, embroidery, needlepoint, silk ribbon and textured embroidery. She uses National Nonwovens WoolFelt® as a ground fabric, for appliqué, bead embroidery, embroidery and silk ribbons designs. Along with designing for publications, Linda currently teaches two correspondence courses for the Embroiderer's Guild of America. She is also a member of CHA, TNNA and EGA. She currently serves on the CHA Designer Section Council.

Contact: 763-545-1009 or 763-229-0434 • Linda@HearthsideCreations.net  

Joining National Nonwovens' Designer Program
- Are you a publication designer?

If you are a designer who is frequently featured in publications and would like to join our Designer Program, please refer to the links below:

• Designer Program Information
• Application Form