Steamboat Pilot & Today

David Taylor was sewing his own Halloween costumes by age 10.

His mother taught him and his five siblings how to sew. That skill paid off last weekend, when Taylor won three ribbons at Quilt Colorado, an event of the Colorado Quilt Council.

Taylor took third place in the small mixed techniques category for his "Colorado Columbine I" quilt -- his most recently created piece -- which took him two months to make.

"I'd never thought I'd do a quilt about flowers, and now, that is what I want to do," Taylor said. "I'm hooked."

His "Elk River, Summer" quilt took first place in the large applique category and won the award for Viewer's Choice.

The quilt took two years and two months to create and is made up of hundreds of fabrics and thousands of pieces. At other competitions, it has won a Judge's Award, a Viewer's Choice Award and has been a finalist in an international competition.

"Elk River, Summer" also has been exhibited at the Quilt Expo in New Hampshire and hung in the men's quilt exhibit at the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum in Golden. It is priced at $15,000.

Taylor never imagined he would make quilts.

"Who in their right mind would cut fabric into little squares and then sew them back together? Not me," Taylor said. "What could be more boring?"

It wasn't until 1999 that Taylor discovered his talent. His quilting friend Madeleine Vail wanted his artistic opinion about how to design the charity quilt for Strings in the Mountains.

Now, when Taylor is not at his full-time job as a graphic artist, he is quilting. He also belongs to a quilting group that meets weekly at the United Methodist Church.

"We do lunch together, take quilting trips together, we shop for fabric, and we exchange fabrics," Taylor said. "It's a great little support group."

Although that group is made up of women, Taylor said there are a lot of men who quilt -- they just don't necessarily show up at festivals.

"I went to a festival in Houston where there were between 200,000 and 300,000 women, and only a dozen men," Taylor said. "No one's ever given me a hard time, but most people are curious about it."

There's nothing to question about Taylor's talent or motivation. He finds inspiration from the environment of Northwest Colorado but said he is going to start branching out.

"My newest piece will be the first quilt that has a person in it," Taylor said. "It will have no trees, no animals and no leaves."

Taylor, who has been an artist all his life, has found a way to combine his talent with an interest in fabrics.

"I've always loved fabrics since I was a kid," Taylor said. "I bought lots of fabric throughout my whole life and never knew what I was going to do with them. It's kind of weird. I had no idea it would lead to this."