GEORGE F. LEE / GLEE@STARBULLETIN.COM
The T-shirts that Ray Woo had collected over 20 years of running marathons and other races were sewn into a quilt. Quilting with the soft T-shirt fabric posed special challenges to quilt-maker Margie Herrick.
When Ray Woo started training for his first Honolulu Marathon 20 years ago, little did he know he was beginning the patchwork for a family heirloom.
A marathoner’s hard-won
accomplishments are memorialized
in a quilt of finisher’s T-shirtsShops offer quilting heirloom lessons
By Ruby Mata-Viti
rmataviti@starbulletin.comEvery year brought another marathon here, a triathlon there, each with the prize of a finisher's shirt. The shirts started to spill out of his closet.
Some shirts were beautifully designed and silk-screened, others touched with raised-ink patterns. He couldn't bear to give any away, as each was associated with good times.
The solution came a stitch in time, and now when Woo sleeps, he is swathed in those memories.
"My mother-in-law is an excellent seamstress and made this quilt for my birthday," he said, showing the bedcover of memorabilia.
Margie Herrick, a retired physical therapist, chuckles humbly when told of her son-in-law's compliment. "I'm probably just better than average," she said from her home in La Jolla, Calif.
GEORGE F. LEE / GLEE@STARBULLETIN.COM
Margie Herrick's "signature" marks her work on son-in-law Ray Woo's personalized quilt.
Herrick sews for a hobby, making gifts for family and friends. She told her daughter June about a classmate in her quilting class who had sewn a quilt using her favorite T-shirts.
"That's when June told me Ray had drawers stuffed with marathon shirts, and asked if I would make one for him so the shirts could be displayed where people could see them."
June boxed up some primary shirts and mailed them off to La Jolla. Herrick had made quilts as gifts for family members before, but nothing that involved T-shirts. She didn't have a pattern to work with but used techniques she learned from having made other, traditional quilts.
It's the same concept, she said, "except T-shirt knit is so flimsy, it's terrible to work with."
The first step was to make the material more manageable by reinforcing it with iron-on woven interfacing, available at fabric stores. She cut the interfacing material to size and ironed it to the inside of each shirt, against the portion of design she wanted, before cutting it out.
To give the quilt its body and softness, she used a lightweight polyester batting, which she said works "perfect for Hawaii's climate."
The hardest task was finding a background fabric that would work with all the pieces.
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When: Noon to 8 p.m. today; 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday
Where: Neal Blaisdell Center
Call: 527-5400
"I wanted something that would blend, not clash, with all the colors," she said. She stayed away from primary colors, eventually choosing a light turquoise cotton fabric. "It made me think of the ocean."
The total time to complete the project, with time spent on concurrent sewing projects, was about two weeks. She estimates the cost of fabric, batting and interface at about $50 and doesn't like to think about the cost of her labor, but she said she's known others who have charged about $255 using a customer's personal shirt collection.
Woo, manager of the Running Room on Kapahulu Avenue, said he's thought about putting the quilt up as a backdrop at one of their many runners' gatherings, but holds back. "It might get all bust up."
One lone patch sits at the bottom left, behind the quilt, away from the blocks of color, which may be the most significant to the Woo family. It's a label that reads, "T-shirts Awarded to Raymond S.H. Woo Assembled by Margie Herrick 12/99."
"In class we learned to label everything we make," Herrick says with a laugh. "In a hundred years someone might want to know who made it."
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