Wells' work on display at library

About three years ago, while in the process of raising two young children, and trying to satisfy her overflowing desire to create fabric art, Valori Wells got into birds.

Not into "birding" (as in bird-watching), but just "into birds." She spent every spare hour she could creating birds in her beautiful energetic mind. By the time her ideas were applied to fabric, she had a 1-year-old and the other two kids had reached 3 and 5 years.

Folks in Sisters can see the results of her artistic interest in birds hanging on the walls of the community room at Sisters Library throughout the month of September.

Wells is a professional quilter, author, fabric and pattern designer, painter and photographer. She also co-owns Stitchin' Post in Sisters. She came to quilting naturally: How could she help it, having a mother who opened Stitchin' Post 35 years ago who shares her love of quilting with everyone?

The world of quilting that she was raised in helped her to create "Simple Start, Stunning Finish," her latest book, published by C&T Publishing in 2007. Her books explore innovative techniques with nature and flowers, joined with her beautiful photography as inspiration. She also wrote "Radiant New York Beauties, Stitch 'N Flip." She and her mother have collaborated on three titles, and just completed a series of "Oh Sew Easy" books on pillows, curtains, duvet covers, and table-toppers. Valori and her friend Carolyn Spencer also co-authored a book "Lifestyle," a young, hip collection of projects for the sewer and quilter.

Valori's love of photography led her to a bachelor's degree in fine arts, focusing on black-and-white photography. That has come in handy in her work.

Her photography is applied to just about all the fabric art she develops today. Wells creates designs for Coats & Clark in South Korea, in a division called Free Spirit Fabrics, and as she puts it, "I used to do all my designs on presentation paper, but the Koreans file things just like a doctor's office: folded up to fit in a file-folder. When I got the designs back it was very difficult to flatten them; so I went to (Adobe) Illustrator, and now do everything in black and white, add color as I see it, and then send them a digital file."

Photography and printmaking brought her to her present career as a fabric designer. For over 13 years she has been presenting a new look to the quilting world and beyond; her fabrics portray larger-than-life images inspired by nature in fresh colors, where details in her designs create an intimacy in pattern and color. She licenses her designs to Peking Handicraft Inc. to be made into rugs, pillows, aprons and kitchen towels.

Her new love of painting - gained with the help of Sisters artist Dennis McGregor - has enhanced her fabric designs and inspired her to take up painting on canvas.

All this talent is compressed into the delightfully colorful fabric designs on display under the auspices of Friends of the Sisters Library.