Sew Many Places with Jim

Hello everyone!

I’ve been at Spring Market these past couple of days, and flying home today. It has been pretty extraordinary to say the least. Getting caught up with old friends, seeing people I’ve been Facebooking and meeting them for the first time (in person), and enjoying all the exciting changes that are happening in the quilting industry.

As I mentioned in my previous blog, we are announcing additional quilting trips for our 2010-2011 schedule. So here they are:

First, the really big news is that quilt legend and icon Jinny Beyer and I are finalizing a tour to India next November. This is really exciting news because India is where Jinny actually started her entire quilting experience, and we are now coming full circle by visiting some of the places that inspired her to begin her extraordinary career. The details will be coming out in the next couple weeks about this India tour, but I have to tell you, there are only 40 spaces available on this once in a lifetime event with Jinny. If you want to travel with one of the greatest quilting legends of our time, you must have your deposit in on this tour to secure your space. Please contact our office and speak with Colleen to put your name on the list to receive information before it is publically announced.

The second tour (that I have had a lot of requests for) is a train ride across the majestic Canadian Rockies from Calgary to Vancouver, with a visit to the lovely city of Victoria, British Columbia (including the Butchart Gardens!). Emma Seabrooke, a prominent member of the American Sewing Guild and Home Sewing Association will be our escort on this tour, along with her husband Al. Both will be traveling on this tour, and then following up with a cruise to Alaska. So this could either be a Canadian Rockies tour, an Alaska cruise, or a combination of the both. Details coming out in the next couple weeks.

The third tour I am announcing is a very exciting cruise with Debbie Homer, from Jenny Haskins Designs. Deb will be our special guest on a Caribbean Cruise next year, and she will focus on embroidary and unique classes that will amaze all who sew and quilt.

Along with these tours, Sew Many Places is planning additional trips to Japan (hosted by e-Quilter.com), to fascinating Iceland with Gundrun Erla Gisladottir, an extraordinary Baltic cruise, a cruise to the Greek Islands, an very special textile tour traveling throughout Northern Italy & Switzerland, a Mexican Riviera Cruise hosted by Charlotte Angotti including a visit to the Long Beach Quilt Show prior to the cruise, Eastern Europe (including Poland, Prague and Budapest), a wonderful fall foliage Canada/New England Cruise hosted by Meg Cox and Rita Fishal, a special East Coast Cruise out of Balitmore with Pat Sloan, an exotic Treasures of Thailand tour, an Alaska Cruise for crafters, a glorious tour through the Wine Regions of France, a quilting expedition to South America (Machu Picchu, the Amazon and the Galapagos Islands) with quilting legend Kaye England, and our signature trips to China, Bali, Ireland, New Zealand, and of course Tuscany that we do every year and know extensively!

As an added special feature to next year’s Bali Expedition we have teamed up with Princess Mirah Batiks and will visit their Batik factory in Bali, participate in a hands-on batik class, and meet Princess Mirah in person and visit her palace. Space is limited to 40 participants and on a first come-first served basis. Kaye England is our very special guest celebrity on this Bali Expedition!

And as many of you already know, we have quilting celebrities Ricky Tims and Alex Anderson going on an African Safari with us in January 2011. There are very few spaces remaining on this tour, infact, nearly 40 people have already signed up, and it is likely the last remaining spaces will last for just another week or so before we have to start the waiting list. This truly will be one of those once in a lifetime experiences not to be missed!

In addition to these more exotic tours, we are adding quite a few JIM WEST QUILTPOSIUM PROGRAMS to next years list, which include traveling with Alex Anderson in the Napa/Sonoma Region of California Wine Country, San Francisco, a visit to the Ricky Tims Studio in La Veta, Colorado (including Santa Fe and Taos), a New York City textile and quilting extravaganza including Broadway, Colonial Williamsburg, Washington D.C., Edmunton (Canada), Savanah, Georgia, and a few other destinations we are finalizing at the moment.

As the oldest, and largest travel company for quilters, Sew Many Places has been passionate for years about providing nothing less than top quality tours, cruises, expeditions and quiltposiums. The calibur of teachers and educators we select to escort our tours are the biggest names in the industry, and your experience with Sew Many Places will be something you will always remember and treasure for the rest of your life. Plus, we have a very large ratio of returning guests-up to 72% of our travelers return on another tour with us. In quoting the Wall Street Journal: “Sew Many Places is a global, upscale tour company for quilters.”

We make our tours incredibly affordable with our “easy pay” payment structure and our full 100% cancellation refund policy, as mentioned in our terms and conditions. We also offer travel insurance, in the event you have to cancel your tour and can not go. We provide the BEST VALUE TOURS in the industry, and do not try to nickel and dime you by wanting you to pay for an additional “optional tour” here and “optional tour” there! Our tours are complete packages! And because many of our tours are oversees, we understand it takes a day or so to get over your jet lag. Therefore, our tours are longer than six or seven days so you can completely enjoy your experience without feeling like you are dragging or too tired to participate. The last thing we feel you would want is to travel a long distance and have less than a week to enjoy it!

As always, you will see Sew Many Places providing you with not only an award winning line up of tours, but we are focused on incorporating everything we know about “Traveling with a Quilters Eye,” and “Exploring the Fabrics of Each Destination.”

Be sure to watch for a separate announcement about each tour we are planning, and let us know if you would like to be on a waitlist to receive information about a particular trip before it is publically announced. Our tours sell out very quickly, sometimes within hours, so don’t miss out on joining us on one of these fantastic journeys!

Thanks for joining me on here today, and happy quilting!

For the past five years many of you have asked us to organize a tour to Japan to see the extraordinary TOKYO INTERNATIONAL QUILT FESTIVAL. Well, this coming January, everything is in place to offer just 40 people, a very special tour of ART, COLOR & DESIGN in this remarkable destination.

This tour is designed for quilters, designers and artists who want to expand their awareness and focus on a culture that has given the world one of a kind creative expressions and “visual treasures” through art, clothing, quilts, embroidary and design.

Our tour departs January 13, 2010 from San Francisco on a non-stop flight to Tokyo. We will stay at first class hotels and be treated like Japanese royalty as we venture out each day to extraordinary destinations. We return back to the United States on January 22nd.

We will visit Tokyo, Kyoto and Nara and as I always say, “Travel with a Quilter’s Eye.” Sew Many Places is very pleased to have onboard with us, color expert Luana Rubin, who will inpire all of us with her knowledge of this extraordinary place. Luana is the co-owner of e-Quilter.com, one of the largest and most successful fabric companies on the internet. Having been to Japan on numerous occassions, Luana will be instrumental in helping our group understand how the Japanese have influenced our world with color, design and art.

Our tour also includes visiting historic temples, castles, Indigo Shibori textile museums, a one of a kind kimono museum and fascinating textile factories. As a very special treat, we have invited a “master” Japanese artist to host an art class exclusively for our group. We will see firsthand how the ancient Japanese art still inspires textile designs of today.

But without doubt, the real highlight of the tour is attending the spectacular Tokyo International Quilt Festival. We will have an entire day to marvel at all of the extraodinary quilts that will be displayed and learn more of how they are influenced by the art history and natural beauty of Japan. We’ll look for design ideas and talk about how to incorporate them into our own art and design.

If you would like more information about this tour, please email me at Jim@SewManyPlaces.com and I will be happy to make sure you are included on the list to receive this information before it is announced next Monday. You can also call our office and place your refundable deposit to secure a space now before all the spaces are sold out. Call toll free at 877.887.1188.

It is our Sew Many Places Tokyo International Quilt Festival tour, co-hosted by e-Quilter.com. Don’t miss out, contact our office today!

Hello everyone!

As a former cruise director for 10 years, author of 4 travel books, and having been chosen by the Travel Channel to star in their tv show Cruise Ships FAQ, I can tell you from experience, there is a lot to finding the right balance in organizing a trip. I’ve been asked by many of you how we are able to add so many things in our itineraries and still have a great price point. That’s a great question, and most of it lies with the fact that I am a professional traveler. Last year I was gone for 300+ days escorting tours out of 365, and next year’s schedule looks even busier! I put our tours together based on what I know I would like, and I have very high standards, but I don’t like to pay an exhorbinant amount of money to enjoy them.

Next week, we will be adding 14 more tours to our already packed schedule based on this principle. We have organized something for everyone! We will be announcing more of our JIM WEST QUILTPOSIUM PROGRAMS, in addition to some very exciting new destinations that I know, as quilters, you are going to find really attractive.

It is true that I do escort most of these tours that we plan, and the reason I do is because it helps to ensure the high standards and excellent quality that I have learned over the years. As a travel professional first, I know what needs to be done to create an extraordinary experience. And that is why I invite seasoned and many times, legendary quilt celebrities, on our trips to provide that “quilting expertise” that you all find attractive.

Our formula at Sew Many Places has always been, do what you do best and don’t try to be a jack of all trades. I am a travel expert, and when I first got into the quilting industry i’m lucky i knew the difference between a bobber from a bobbin! And over the years, I have learned a great deal about quilting and how the industry works, primarily by surrounding myself with real “quilting experts” who travel on our tours and do what they do best.

In the new trips we are announcing next week, you will see a good variety and selection of destinations, prices, teachers and quilting options.

By the way, I appreciate all the emails and phone calls you send to me with your comments about our trips. It confirms what we are doing right, and gives us an opportunity to make our company even better with some of your suggestions.

So be watching for our announcement next week, because I think you are really going to be blown out of the water with the incredible cruises and tours we have to add to our already exciting travel brochure!

In the past couple of months, and based on talking to a lot of professionals and quilters who have been quilting for many years, and especially looking at the state of the economy and the interesting things that are going on in our industry at the moment, I have notice there is a real shift taking place in the quilting world.

I don’t say that in a negative way, but rather, it almost feels like a rebirth of sorts. Some of the big players are no longer the big players, and the creativity and imagination of up and coming quilters and businesses are now starting to get people’s attention. And rightly so.

I am seeing more male quilters coming into the spotlight. Men who are not afraid to jump into what has for the most part, been a woman dominated industry. I also see traditional quilting now has some very exciting new quilters showing more of an artisic form and even crossing the line into other medias.

I am also seeing companies and individuals who are icons in the quilt industry, being more creative than ever, and designing new ways to be different and continue being a front runner in their particular area of expertise.

But the real change I see happening, and I know this is no surprise to any of you, lies in what quilters are willing to spend money on these days. They don’t seem to just throw their money away on purchasing fabric, for the sake of just purchasing fabric. There is a real focus on buying for specific projects and only spending money if they feel there is value in the merchandise they are buying, the class they might be taking or the quilting vacation they might decide to go on.

I know myself, we have been more creative than ever in designing cruises and tours that provide the value I believe people are wanting to spend money on. From our new Jim West Quiltposium Programs to the new and special ways we make it affordable for people to go on our more expensive trips, there is this creative and exciting way all of us are approaching the industry.

I am going to be very interested to see how it all plays out in the months ahead. I for one am really very excited by it all, and I wonder if any of you are noticing any changes yourself. I would really like to know your thoughts about anything you have observed in your neck of the woods or even on a national level. You can email me directly or simply comment right here on my blog.

From magazines and online fabric shops, sewing machine manufacturers to thread companies, there are changes happening. The quilt industry is in transition, and I believe incredible things are going to come out of it when it’s all said and done!