About Vendulka
Vendulka Battais is an award winning textile artist, tutor and half of the couple running textile studio OliVen in the heart of Suffolk.
Vendulka started her creative journey making clothes from remnants with her mum in the Czech Republic. She learned simple patchwork when she moved to the UK and was looking for a new hobby. From squares and triangles, Vendulka’s work evolved into quilting, embroidery, and circular patterns inspired by mandalas and dreamcatchers.
It was this growing passion which led her to start her own patchwork and quilting shop with her partner, Olivier, on the Isle of Wight in 2011. It’s called OliVen. In 2015, they moved family and shop to the village of Monks Eleigh in Suffolk.
Vendulka loves to make patchwork quilts, teach patchwork in the shop, travel to teach groups and demonstrate at shows.
Somehow she found the time to publish a wonderful book, Cathedral Windows – New Views, and win the Best in Show Award at Festival of Quilts 2021. This is what the judges had to say about the work: “a wonderful collaboration of design and workmanship. We loved the variety of feathers and their balance of glorious colour. A masterclass in the stitching of an intricate Mandala, together with precise use of the glitter liner medium.”
Signature Technique
Bringing embroidery into quilting
Top Tips
- Glittery and metallic paint on fabric brings a project to life – especially in the dark!
- Create an enhanced 3D effect on Cathedral windows with folded patchwork, padding, and a new colour twist.
- Combine different elements such as machine quilting and hand embroidery. It’s a joy to work on and the result is stunning.
Videos
Patterns
Posts
Angela Madden and Barbara Weeks
Jennie: Had mad day yesterday filming Angela doing her amazing Multi - Plait and her Circle Slice. Angela did a great job on the demos and now I feel I could make a multi-plaited cuved slice of twiddling! Dream on - if I only had the time. Then we all repaired to local pub for lunch and off to Barbara's carrying cakes (made by Angela!) for extra sustenance.
How to Bind your Quilt
A small strip of fabric gives the finishing touch to your quilt and this video guides you through those steps. www.justhands-on.tv/videos/1/ It includes discussion about use of the walking foot; simple quilting on the quilt, how to mark the quilt and a suggestion about the stitches you can use - again with the walking foot; you learn what seam allowance is necessary and, most importantly, how to create the mitred corner to give a perfect finish.
Festival of Quilts, NEC 2009
Val: what a fantastic show! Such a wide variety of traders with amazing products (and quilts) - workshops and truely amazing quilts - traditional/modern, artistic and creative, creations ranging from lingerie to vases, clothing to boxes. There was a wonderful showcase from the young graduates which is reassuring as it means that our passion will be continued. The boys from Bizview.tv joined Jennie and I on the Sunday and we managed to get interviews to Gail Lawther and her husband Chris; Philippa Naylor, Karin Hellaby, Paula Doyle, SAQA, toured the Hanging Together exhibition and took shots of the quilts themselves.