Kaffe Fassett autograph quest

Buffy, I know you want Kaffe to autograph your Romeo & Juliet Coat at the presentation in October, so here's a story about a Kaffe autograph you'll love!

It has all elements I love in it: Kaffe jackets, needlepoint, pansies (I had a Boxer named Pansy, the best dog ever!), and Moms! It's from Raveler KayTheArky, who sold the Kaffe jacket off her back in the St. Louis airport, and I'd give this Big Pansy Jacket two big red hearts if I could!

My mother designed and began this in the early 1990s - she used Kaffe’s Damask Flower jacket pattern, but for the flower she used one of the pansies in Kaffe’s needlepoint pillow (Glorious Needlepoint) of pansies and adapted it to a much larger scale. She was in her middle 80s at the time, and she worked quite slowly - it’s a large project and each line has so many colors in it.

In 1996 when Kaffe was doing a book tour for his Glorious Quilts, he did a presentation at a library in Ohio where I was working, and I got to set up the whole event. (Thrill! Thrill!) For decorations, I “did” the library branch in finished Kaffe-designed sweaters, both my own and borrowed from friends. From mom I got the partly finished jacket, still on a big circular needle, and her graphs; I did a display of them with the needlepoint book showing the original pansy. A “process” photo, you know?

Kaffe was delighted, and wrote lovely compliments on the edges of the graph! Mom was tickled; but she never got to finish the sweater - age and health problems intervened. She worked on it a bit at a time till she died at 92, and she made me promise that I would finish it. What a job. It’s now up to about where the sleeves start.

There are probably five, six or more Kaffe Long Leaf Coats on or near the needles now and quiet a few have been completed, but your Romeo and Juliet Coat might be the first in decades. No other Raveler has posted it as a project. So do ask Kaffe to sign your fabulous project, and break a leg!