A Tribute to Doreen Speckmann

by Celia Eddy
published: 19/01/2001
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Although I was never lucky enough to meet her, I was a tremendous admirer of Doreen Speckmann. So it was a great sadness to hear of her untimely death last year, during a visit to the UK.

We all have our favourite patchwork books and one of my all-time, must-have books was her book Pattern Play, published in 1993 by C & T Publishing.

I love using patchwork blocks and this book made a big impression on me because it gave me so many methods and ideas for designing my own quilts. I first bought it in 1995 and immediately started 'playing with pattern' using Doreen's suggestions. One of the first results was 'Serendipity Stars'.

'Serendipity Stars' Detail

You'll note that, basically, it's just a simple Ohio Star block, but enthused by Doreen's ideas, I did a little designing in the sashings. The resulting effect is a bit of an 'eye-fooler' because it's hard to pick out the block from the sashings. It's called 'Serendipity Stars' because the bright cream stars just seemed to appear by accident.

Books by Doreen Speckmann
Pattern Play, C & T Publishing,1993
Travels with Peaky and Spike, Martingale & Co. inc.,1999

© Celia Eddy