Abbey Lane Quilts

Pretty, funky, colorful, and cool — all describe what you see in patterns by Abbey Lane Quilts, created by Janice Liljenquist and Marcea Owens. They love to blend the old with the new to make something entirely original! Read on to see how these good friends took their hobby to a new level!
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We are so excited to be writing for the Jolly Jabber! We have been longtime readers of it and have been ordering fabric from the Fat Quarter Shop since long before we started designing patterns. Our new company, Abbey Lane Quilts, was started last December, and it has been an exciting and surprising adventure so far!

The beginnings of our company started almost 20 years ago, when we first became friends. We met at church and then discovered our kids were participating in many of the same sports and activities. As our friendship grew, we discovered lots of things we had in common — we both love to cook, sew, and decorate. As quilters often do, we started making projects together. On almost every quilt we made, we ended up changing the pattern somehow. One thing led to another, and now that our children are mostly grown and out of the house, we decided it was time to focus more on the hobby we love so much and try and take it to the next level, thus Abbey Lane Quilts was born.

As partners, we have different styles and tastes. Janice likes an old-fashioned look and Marcea loves a modern feel. When you combine these together, it give our patterns a unique combination of traditional quilting with “a twist”, as Janice says. Lots of things inspire us, but out biggest inspiration comes from the fabric itself. Every piece of fabric has a feel to it, and discovering that “feel” and then turning it into a quilt is the best part. As far as our teamwork goes, Marcea likes the design and colors, and Janice likes the sewing, quilting, and pattern writing. We both throw in our two bits into each other’s jobs, so it takes both of us to come up with a pattern.

One of our favorite patterns is The Abbey Bag. It is a pincushion and scrap bag all packaged into an adorable little flower. They are fun and easy to make. We have them by our sewing machines, cutting boards, ironing boards and just about anywhere else we can stick them. One is never enough.

We had our first quilts displayed at quilt market in Portland this past May with Joel Dewberry and Donna Dewberry. This Fall, we had our very own booth at Market in Houston and introduced 21 patterns.

We really were the new kids on the block, but we have had great support from everyone. We were thrilled and honored to receive the 2nd place award for booth decoration. As for our future projects, we already have three quilts almost done for this Spring. We are very fortunate to be able to work with some great fabric designers, and we have some exciting new patterns in the works with those collections. We hope you can stop by our site and check out our latest ideas.

Janice and Marcea
Abbey Lane Quilts
Abbey Lane Quilts: The Blog