The women behind the new podcast “Quilt Your Heart Out” describe the show as Car Talk for quilters. On this hour of Talk of Iowa, Charity Nebbe talks quilting and podcasting with Marianne and Mary Fons, best known as the hosts of the PBS television show "Love of Quilting."
"It's a four billion dollar industry," says Mary Fons, who compares it to the $3 billion industry of online dating. "And now we've had this influx of younger quilters, the modern quilt guild movement, where you've got 30-somethings making quilts that are much, much different from the traditional style."
She says that it's not just young people getting into quilting but also men. During this hour of Talk of Iowa, a man from Aledo, Texas called to say he's been secretly quilting by hand for years.
"It's construction," says Marianne Fons. "I've often been surprised more men don't quilt because it is really a lot like woodworking."
They also talk about online quilting communities, what it was like for Mary to learn to quilt on national television when she replaced Liz Porter on the show, and Marianne's newest endeavor, the Iowa Quilt Museum, set to open its doors this May in Winterset, Iowa.
