Threads of Connection

Announcing my licensing partnership with QT Fabrics

I still remember the moment the news became real. After all the researching, the sketches, the quiet hoping—there it was: I'm officially licensing with QT Fabrics. I had to sit with it for a minute. For a designer who built a brand around the idea that fabric can carry a story, this feels like the start of a whole new chapter.

I want to tell you about it, because the why matters just as much as the what.

A little about my corner of the story

I'm Julianna Hukill, the designer behind Shaylily. I create surface patterns for fabric, along with quilting accessories, gifts, and keepsakes for quilters and makers—including my signature product, The Quilt Keepsake Book. This year I'm also completing my MFA, which has stretched and sharpened how I think about design.

But the heart of what I do is simpler than any of that. I'm a mother of two grown children, and somewhere along the way I learned that the things we make by hand are never just things. A quilt isn't only fabric and thread. It's a record of who made it and who it was made for. That belief is the thread running through everything I design—work that tells a story and creates connection between makers and the people they're creating for.

A little about QT

Here's the part that still gives me goosebumps.

QT Fabrics is an employee-owned company, and its parent company, Cranston Print Works, was founded in 1807—making it the oldest surviving textile company in the United States. The story reaches all the way back to a cotton printing plant established by a Rhode Island governor. Two hundred years of American textile history, carried forward by the people who actually do the work.

And QT has stayed devoted to something I care about deeply: premium quilting fabric, made for the independent quilt shops and the quilting community that keep this craft alive.

Why this partnership feels right

When I look at my own little brand and then at two centuries of textile heritage, the gap could feel intimidating. Instead, it feels like a meeting of the same values across time.

QT has spent generations believing that quality fabric is worth doing right, and that the quilting community is worth serving with care. I've spent my career believing that fabric is how makers say I made this for you. Different scales, same heart.

That's why this isn't just a business arrangement to me. It's two stories—one brand-new, one over 200 years in the making—deciding to stitch something together.

What's coming

This is just the announcement, so I'm keeping a few surprises tucked away for now. But I can tell you that everything I bring to QT will carry the Shaylily spirit: designs meant to be passed between hands, to mark a moment, to connect the person who made something with the person who receives it.

I'd love for you to come along for the journey. Follow Shaylily to see the collections as they take shape, and to be the first to know when they arrive at your favorite quilt shop.

Thank you for being part of this story. The best parts are still ahead—and I can't wait to share them with you.

— Julianna