A Quilts with Style Farewell

As we draw near to the end of the year, Stephen and I have had to make the most painful and heart-wrenching decision that we've ever faced. The Foundation Piecer originally started in our basement, with a ridiculously small budget, and our dream to bring the joy and magic of foundation piecing to the quilting world. Our first years were very bumpy as we learned from each new mistake and were well rewarded with the support of eager foundation piecers everywhere. It seemed as though we had united the foundation piecing enthusiasts and offered a new and unique publication that fed the creative need of quilters for intricate and inspirational quilt patterns.
There have been many days in the last 12 years that we believed that we were the luckiest people in the world—we spent our days designing, sewing, and creating the most beautiful quilts to share with you. We are both very grateful and thankful to have been a part of your life.
While we had many loyal fans of our 100% foundation piecing format, we were still struggling to keep the magazine afloat. With renewed enthusiasm and a change to include new techniques and articles, Quilts with Style was born. We're pleased to say that while Quilts with Style was met with great success, there were also significant failures. It seemed that no matter how hard we tried, we were not able to appeal to a large enough audience to make the magazine truly successful, despite our best efforts.
Early last year, our family was struck with tragedy. Working through this process has made us both realize that no matter how much we love the magazine, family comes first. The long hours and endless commitments that we had with the magazine made it clear to us that somehow we had let things get out of control. While the magazine was holding its own, we couldn't afford desperately needed staff to help us with everyday tasks and found ourselves doing everything from designing, sewing, answering the phones and even packing and shipping the mail, which left little time for anything else. With tragedy comes a period of reflection on every facet of life. For us, we realized that if the budget could not support additional staff, then drastic action was needed as it was becoming impossible for us to bear the load alone.
After looking at our budget for next year and seeing that things would not change, we knew that we would be forced to make a difficult decision. With much regret, this issue (November/December 2007) will be the last issue of Quilts with Style. We've been unsuccessful in finding a buyer to take over the magazine so it will no longer be published. However, we still have plenty of back issues and books in stock should you need them. Additionally, we'll still be selling books, back issues, and patterns on quiltswithstyle.com so we hope that you'll continue to support the site and allow to us help with your quilting needs.
Every end is also an opportunity for a new beginning. We're here to stay in the quilting world, but we've realized that we need to change our focus. Instead of producing Quilts with Style, we'll be selling individual patterns on eQuiltPatterns.com. Additionally, we'll be returning to our beginnings—producing patterns. In addition to the electronic patterns, we'll also be creating a new line of printed patterns that can purchase through us or found in your local quilt shop. Allowing us to remain true to ourselves, we can return to our original intention of creating the best quilting patterns available. You can select just those patterns that you'd like, and not having to wade through those that you don't want. We've had great success with this site and hope that you will continue to be a part of our lives there as well.
In closing, we wish to thank you for 12 wonderful years! We appreciate your past support and are grateful for your loyalty and friendship. We feel truly blessed to have had this fantastic opportunity and look forward being a source of inspiring and unique quilt patterns for many more years to come.
Kind Regards,
Liz Schwartz & Stephen Seifert