Debra Milkovich uses bold saturated colors and high contrast to create her impactful quilts. She is always thinking about the design on different layers of dimension, and hopes when people see her quilts, they have questions and are surprised as they look closely at the details in each of her pieces.
Always an artist, or was there a “moment”?
I had initially wanted to be an artist, but at my mom’s urging I became a pharmacist. I did that for several years before kids and military life and a couple armed robberies convinced me to just stay home.
While I was doing art in school, I hadn’t found any medium that I was crazy about, like I am with quilting, so it wasn’t that hard to persuade me to choose a different path. When I let go of the idea of art as a career, I still had this pull to make and create.
I’d always be looking for furniture to repurpose or something to repaint. There was even a period there where I taught myself to craft fancy soaps from scratch and another time where I was constantly making homemade breads.
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I have always had some sort of project to work on. At some point I began to imagine that I would enjoy quilting if I could figure out how to sew. I knew I liked to build/construct things, and I imagined quilting could be the perfect marriage of useful, beautiful and fun-to-make. It was between that and woodworking, and I felt I was less likely to lose a hand with a sewing machine.
How did you get started designing quilts?
My husband bought me a little Janome sewing machine for Christmas in 2010, but it wasn’t until 2017 that I found a friend to walk me through the basics, and I was immediately OBSESSED. Within 6 months I had made my first quilt (a simply pieced, double sided king quilt) and then upgraded to a Bernina 770QE.
I didn’t love my first quilt but fell in love with the process. To keep my hands busy, I used to crochet a little. I enjoyed learning new stitches, but I didn’t have the attention span to do 50,000 of them to actually make something. Quilting was so different, with such a variety of skills involved, it kept my brain engaged the whole time.
Despite the endless supply of patterns and fabric collections out there, I really struggled to find a canned project that really got me excited. My style in general is kinda weird and eclectic, so while I didn’t know what I was looking for, I also didn’t know how to come up with anything on my own.
Then the algorithms of Facebook persistently nudged me to the National Quilt Museum’s brand-new Block of the Month program, and that sent me in a totally unexpected direction. This program promised to introduce a new technique with each block, it was free of charge and “scrap-friendly”. It felt very low-commitment, which my anxiety appreciated, it gave some focus for my ADHD brain, and there were incentives to finish and also a competitive element. It was such an attractive package!
This program is still on-going, and I talk about it every chance I get, because I love it, and I owe so much of who I am as a quilter to it. It started me out on this journey of exploration through the worlds of traditional, contemporary and art quilting, and then I went out on my own trying to learn even more about any other techniques, products and notions I could find.
Each month they presented (what I approached as) a serious art project, and I would spend the entire month (or more) developing the concept, choosing fabrics and thinking of outside-the-box ways to bring it all together. I didn’t try to make the blocks look cohesive. It was interesting in the end when they all seemed to fit together. It made me think that I must have some sort of subconscious style in my head somewhere. This process of just letting the design and concept direct my fabric choices just made so much sense to me.
The second year of doing this BOM program, I decided that I would expand on the experience by challenging myself to learn how to design a new block each month using the featured technique and theme. I followed the NQM’s educational program for about two and a half years before I went off looking for challenges elsewhere. I had no idea what I would do on my own, but I felt super confident that I could figure out how sew just about anything I could imagine.
What do you do differently? What is your signature that makes your work stand out as yours? (This answer also encompasses: Maximalist. What do you think makes a piece ‘maximal’?)
My style gravitates to bold saturated colors, sharp edges, and high contrast.
My most recent work kind of digs into optical puzzles. When I think about my compositions, I am almost always thinking about the design on different layers of dimension, like how colors and shapes would flow in the background versus what shapes I imagine to be in the foreground.
I like to explore weird ways of showing depth and dimension from color theory, to textures and patterns to op-art and weird science. I want people to look at my quilts and have questions and be surprised. I am a maximalist at my core, though.
If I come up with ways to add additional elements or visual experiments, my brain will force my hand to follow through. I rather there be too much, than not enough. I rather someone be overwhelmed than bored. You know, I’m not someone that understands art at an academic level, but I assume that Maximalism is more of a superficial aesthetic, one that is busy and makes your brain speed up as it tries to process what its seeing. My favorite reaction to my work is when people have their first glance, and their reflex is “woah!”, and their eyes get big, and they pull back. It doesn’t mean that they necessarily like it, but it grabbed them and made them pay attention.
I want to always be making quilts that push me to my limits, have layers of complexity and are embedded with secret treasures. Concept quilts with a strong visual impact are what Im most excited to make. The ones that have a story or a joke to tell are the ones I love most and feel like they have a soul.
Ironically though, these don’t look anything like the quilts I had initially imagined I’d be making 6 years ago (nor are they at all useful! Haha!), but it’s just what I find fun and interesting to make.
When it comes to creating, are you more of a planner or an improviser?
I am maybe a planner and an improviser?
My quilts generally start with a novel idea or experiment that requires a certain level of precision or research. Because quilting is a pretty slow process, there is a lot of time to roll random thoughts around in my head, and this is where I tend to make connections between my life and the imagery or undeveloped concept I’m working on. From here, the quilt will progress in the direction of the developing narrative.
I don’t do “improv quilting” in the traditional sense, because I generally have pretty precise objectives, but the initial idea is usually just a small part of the final piece.
Which part of the design process is your favorite?
Planning and designing are my favorite parts of the process. I’d be happy to just think about quilts all day long and never actually make them, but that isn’t nearly as impressive. Haha!
I used to design all my quilts on graph paper, but in 2022 I taught myself EQ8 and unlocked a whole new world! It was really exciting! It doesn’t replace my pencil and paints, but it really elevated and revolutionized my process.
When is your most productive creative time?
I work best at night. When I’m inspired, I can’t sleep. As I mentioned, I have ADHD and my ability to work is often all or nothing. I get almost manic when I find the inspiration to start working on something I’m excited about, and often just have to force myself to go to bed.
Quilting isn’t very relaxing to me – I sew like it’s an emergency. It always takes longer than I think it will. I am always dying to share the progress, but I have to play games with my brain, where I can only share once I reach a certain goal. Its like I am always chasing the dopamine as fast as I can. This is how I get hyper-focused and can’t easily stop what I am doing. I don’t have as much control over my conditions if I am working during the day because of all the grown-up stuff everyone wants me to do. Ugh.
And I really don’t much care for natural light either. I like warm, incandescent light that gives colors such a nice deep richness. Natural light washes them out. It reflects off fabric in a way that makes my quilts look dull and diluted. And more importantly, it’s inconsistent. I don’t want to know what time it is or how long I have been working. I want to be working without time even existing. Its so annoying to go into my sewing room at 10pm and 2 hours later, look at the clock and suddenly it’s 5am and my husband is about to wake up and find out I’ve accidentally been sewing all night long. He is never impressed. Haha!
How do you balance a busy family life with creative work?
My husband is usually pretty supportive once I get started on something. He understands that quilting is a priority, and when he is able, he will take over as primary caregiver to the kids and let me just disappear into my sewing space if need be.
And, three of my four kids are obsessed with making art, and won’t go anywhere without their art journal and case of pencils and pens, so they understand. Art is just an integral part of our family.
Are you a “finisher”? How many UFOs do you think you have?
Because of how my brain works, I need deadlines and adrenaline to finish projects. When I am focused on a deadline, I hyperfocus and will work marathon hours. Without deadlines, there is no urgency and I get overwhelmed by the infinite number of ways to do things.
I am never caught up with my projects and I am NEVER finished early. I am always frantically sewing until the last minute. I think I have 5 WIPs that are beating around in various states of doneness at the moment.
Also, without deadlines, there is this sense that anything I make shouldn’t fall anywhere short of perfect if I technically have the time to do it right. I have immense respect for the “quilt police”, and deeply appreciate those technical standards of greatness that go beyond surface design, although you wouldn’t know it if you looked close at my quilts, because the ones I finish are so FAR from perfect!
I always want to know the right and best way to do things, even though I may not be capable or have the patience to do it. So while I know better, deadlines force me to accept the old “finished over perfect” approach.
Describe your creative space.
It is a big mess. We are military, so it seems like I am constantly packing and unpacking it. We just moved for the 3rd time in three years last summer (2023), so I’ve been trying to do a proper unpack of the whole house finally, which gets really old when you’ve moved as many times as we have. For the last few months, I’ve been working at the living room coffee table, doing either computer work, hand sewing or sketching/painting quilt concepts. I’ve not started anything major in a while.
Unpacking my sewing space had taken a low priority, but I think it’s finally as good as it’s going to get. We are fortunate that this house has enough bedrooms for me to have my own room. Even though it’s small, it’s nice to have my mess out of sight. But, for better or worse, it’s pretty isolated from everyone in the house, except for the cats, who are obsessed…even our half-feral fosters, who suspect that one day I might decide to eat them, will risk their life to snuggle on the unlimited make-shift beds and hide in the most impossible to reach nooks and crannies.
The space itself, even at its most organized, is very chaotic, and weirdly reminiscent of my childhood bedroom, which was covered with posters, stickers, and trinkets from floor to ceiling. I can’t ever put things away, so making it tidy is never really a goal, because when my supplies are hidden, I forget I have them or can’t find things…But my shelves and walls are filled with lots of pop-culture and music memorabilia and my collection of slightly weird vintage ceramics (which is a whole other obsession of mine).
There is also lots of fabric and thread everywhere, of course. I put my fabric in the closet, but I took the doors off so I could see all of it better. They are folded in bins on metal shelving, separated by prints, solids, batiks, yardage, and garment fabrics and organized sort of by color. There are clear bins of seldom used art supplies tucked all around the room.
The whole space is very colorful and pretty intense. A buddy of mine once described my workspace as “visually exhausting” which I thought was both hilarious and very accurate. I finally got a very nice and HEAVY Amish-made custom sewing table last year with fancy lifts for my machine and serger, with fold out surfaces on three sides which makes quilting so much more pleasant…it’s so freaking nice and maybe the only grown-up looking thing in the whole room.
Do you use a sketchbook or journal? How does that help your work develop?
I do. I am weirdly compulsive about the exact brand of notebook and pencil I need to work. I have these graph paper notebooks that have dots instead of lines that I love.
For me, it’s quick and easy to just be able to simply draw any ideas that are beating around in my brain. It’s also easier for me to work out the scale of visual elements and often experiment with complex ideas in a very low-tech and low-risk way.
If I can tell it is going to be worth the effort, I will transfer the pattern to digital form using Electric Quilt 8. Once in EQ8, I can more efficiently experiment with colors.
Journals also just help me keep track of my ideas and plans too. I have no idea how to efficiently and effectively manage digital information long term. And working with something tangible, like a notebook, keeps me grounded and on track. When things get digital, I lose track of the process and can forget my initial intent.
When you travel, do you create while on planes and in waiting areas? What is in your creative travel kit?
In the last couple of years my hand sewing has really increased.
I used to just travel with my journal and pencil, but now I always have a project bag with me. It is usually pretty well stocked. Right now I’m trying to finish this 3D monarch mini quilt that I initially started as part of a challenge, but the deadline came and went, so progress has reeeeeeeally slowed down.
My bag has several spools of thread, my favorite John James needles, my fancy thimble (plus a spare, just in case!), folding scissors, my pencils and journal, and some fancy little Japanese candies to bribe my kids for good behavior.
One of my new favorite things is buying vintage cigarette cases and decorative face powder cases and converting them into fun travel sewing kits and needle storage. (And depending on where I’m headed, there might be a bottle of Fireball whiskey in there too. Haha!)
How often do you start a new project?
I am definitely not a prolific quilter. I have four young daughters (5, 7, 11 and 12), so starting a quilt is a serious step. It means that everyone in the family is going to probably have to do a little more while I am distracted with my work.
I started sewing in 2017, and since then, we have moved from Kansas to Hawaii to South Carolina to Pennsylvania and then back to Hawaii, I’ve had a baby, lost my mom, and the whole Covid thing, too. I have no idea what stability is, and so there isn’t any real sort of rhythm to my creative process.
Do you work actively on more than one project at a time?
I usually work on a few things at once. Oh! Something really annoying that my brain does to me when I feel that I have a comfortable amount of time to finish a project is, it will think of something interesting to make, and then I convince myself that I have time to squeeze in this new project and still be able to finish the first project before the deadline.
So essentially, if I don’t have enough anxiety, I will intentionally/unintentionally create panic, which creates an environment where I can’t lose momentum. Haha! But if I do get stuck on how to proceed with a project, I will set it aside and work on something else while my brain can more passively mull over ideas.
Can you tell us about the inspiration and process of one of your works?
My most significant quilt to-date is Thursday Night Fever, aka “The Rock ‘n’ Roll quilt”.
It was inspired by the closing of a night club that used to play the music I grew up listening to.
It started as an Instagram based100-day project that I began Jan 1, 2021, during Covid lockdowns. At this time, I was also dealing with my mom who had recently become terminally ill. While these two things couldn’t be more unbalanced, they both seemed to contribute to this feeling of a growing separation between my adult and child self.
For the project, I was going to recreate the cover art to 100 of my favorite albums I grew up listening to. Revisiting all these old albums triggered a lot of great memories and gave me and my mom something other than her health to talk about. Growing up with physical albums/cassettes/CDs in hand, made the album art and music sort of inseparable. It became important to me early on that the covers be pretty literal and immediately identifiable to those that knew them.
Each album cover was 5”x5” (finished) and treated as its own individual mini art quilt. I probably used 30 or more different sewing techniques to create the 100 blocks, several of which I had never previously attempted, such as thread painting. I started each block with a to-scale print out of the album cover and a light box, and from there I would determine the best path forward, whether it be FPP or appliqué or (more often than not) a combination of several techniques.
The intense pace, high expectations and daily accountability from my handful of enthusiastic followers really put the (welcome and necessary) pressure on me to produce. I was so obsessed and hyper-focused. Despite some serious exhaustion, I clung to my momentum for as long as I could and made it to day 85 under these high-stress conditions. (My mom died on day 55, but I never talked about it on my IG.)
The pile of blocks sat untouched, and I was not motivated to finish them, until the year anniversary of my mom’s passing when I received an email inviting me to bring my blocks to the European Patchwork Meeting in France. It felt like a sign from The Universe. I immediately agreed, because I knew this pressure would be the only way it would ever get finished. It would be another six months or so before I could bring myself to revisit it – the mental resistance to working on those blocks again was incredibly strong!
I finally finished the last 15 album covers and decided that I would proceed with my original concept of setting them in a light-up disco floor, that I then designed in EQ8. The last details I added to the quilt were the appliqued album centers and buttons for the “hole” in the records. The fabrics chosen to be the record centers remind me of the four women who helped support me during that time of mental instability, helping get this project finished. And the buttons were donated by several of my Instagram followers, who were also such an important part of this project.
How does a new work come about?
I am very concept driven, and I am very sentimental and love old cool/weird stuff…I think a lot of my design thoughts and plans revolve around how I can bring a certain memory or sense of nostalgia into a quilt.
Which part is a challenge for you?
Transitioning from brainstorming and designing, to cutting and sewing is the hardest part – the shift from theoretical to reality. It requires a lot of commitment, abandoning potential and making consequential decisions.
EQ8 has really helped with that though, because I can transition from creating the design to having a pattern in hand by just hitting the print button. Also, I can audition colors in there and really feel confident in how it will look in the end.
Going from piecing the top to quilting is also pretty painful, because once I get to that point, I realize the quilting design is sort of an afterthought. Realizing how the quilting can enhance a design is so important and something I need to be better at.
Do you critique your own work?
At every single step! Haha!
I haven’t really made that many quilts, even though I am thinking about quilting, or at least things that are quilt-adjacent almost all the time.
When I am looking at other people’s quilts, my favorites are ones that are mind-blowingly perfect, because it’s a level of quilting I will surely never achieve. But my next favorite are those that make me lean in closer and wonder how they’re made. So that is always what I am aiming for…combining multiple techniques, colors and textures to create a little confusion.
I’m maybe more interested in creating an effect, like something that is surprising or unexpected, than just focusing purely on the aesthetics. I overthink everything and it’s exhausting!
Where can people see your work?
I mostly put my stuff out on Instagram @debbiedoesquilts, but all that information gets pushed out to my Debbie Does Quilts Facebook page. I also have a website at www.debbiedoesquilts.com.
Interview posted April 2024
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