Fremont man finds his calling sewing and working at Country Traditions

Scott Flanagan lives above the hustle of Main Street in a high-ceiling, sky lighted apartment.

Neatly placed around the large central room are his creations ... quilts in bright colors, oranges, aquas, bright blues and greens. The room vibrates with color.

"I love living in downtown Fremont," he says. "I lived in Omaha for a year and commuting every day put 600 miles on my car each week. Now I average 200 miles, maybe, a month. I can walk everywhere I want to go."

Flanagan says he has stacks of quilts, and that is exactly what he means. Quilts and pieced projects are carefully stacked or stored in plastic bins. Bins also store fabric, yards and yards of fabric.

"I make them and they stack up," he says. "Usually, I make a quilt because I want to make it. I figure that my kids can deal with all of them. That will be their problem some day."

Christmas gifting is simplified by compiling his gift list months in advance, then creating a pieced item specifically for that person. This year he made table runners, bed quilts and wall hangings. He coordinates the fabric colors with the home decor of the recipient.

"This Christmas I made 15 quilted pieces for my family in Colorado and Nebraska," he says.

Quilting is an unusual art for a young man to pursue. Flanagan was influenced by his grandmother who sewed Lutheran World Relief quilts and by his mother, who also sews.

Perhaps the event that moved quilting into front place in his artistic endeavors was the making of a quilt for a beloved teacher.

"I really got into quilting when I was a junior in high school," he says. "We had a choir director in middle school who liked our class so well, she followed us into high school. A bunch of her students wanted to do something special for her. I visited with some adults and they let me know about a grant called 'Youth as Resources.' I applied and got a $500 grant, enough to pay for the whole project. We gave it (the finished quilt) at the last concert of our junior year.

"The quilt had photos of that year's concerts and over 300 signatures of students, faculty and staff. I planned and executed the whole thing. The teacher and I were close and art has always been my thing."

Flanagan came to Fremont to attend Midland Lutheran College. He graduated with concentrations in marketing and management. While living at the dorms he made special quilts for people and mended things.

"It was my stress reliever while I was in school," he says.

"I worked for Country Traditions my senior year and after graduation went to full time."

He is in charge of Pfaff Sewing Machine sales for the store.

Surrounded by beautiful fabrics is both a temptation and a blessing. Flanagan sees his color choices becoming more refined.

"Before, I did only bright colors and now I am comfortable working with all areas of color," he says. "Currently, one my projects uses burgundy, beige, dark blue and hunter green. It's a lap sized quilt in a Courthouse Steps (version of a log cabin block) but built around a center square."

It's the fabric, its vibrant colors and striking patterns that excite Flanagan's artist's eye.

"I enjoy working with colors and fabric choice rather than pattern design," he says. "The selection of fabric and matching that with a design is what I like that ... that and the actual cutting and piecing of the fabric. I'm beginning to enjoy the actual quilting of the piece, the finishing and machine embroidery.

Also in Flanagan's apartment are three sewing machines ... one used for piecing, one for embroidery and one for backup. The piecing and embroidery machines sit on folding tables behind his futon. Good south light streams in from a very long window.

"A real cool part of the embroidery world is that they are now taking our quilting designs and turning them into embroidery designs," he says.

Quilts and pieced hangings make lively wall art and are boldly displayed in the apartment. Two full-sized quilts lay on his bed in a west alcove and the glass in the French doors that separate the sleeping from the living area are covered with quilts.

The open space is warmed by the use of quilts as decorating items, softening the stark white walls, 14-foot ceilings, tall windows and row of transomed doors. The rainbow colors of finished quilted projects that are beginning to form a tower up one wall add more interest to the room.

When asked what his plans are for their use or distribution, Flanagan answers with a smile, "My girlfriend tells me that her parents warn her that someday she will have to deal with all the things in their house. I feel my kids might as well have to do that as well."

Some of Flanagan's work hangs on the walls and in the open spaces of the Country Traditions store in downtown Fremont. His current specialization is in making lap-sized quilts.

"I don't like doing really big things or really small projects," he says. "Lap size is the size I prefer."

This is where Flanagan's art is taking him at this point in his life.

He is interested in other art forms, especially photography, and may find new ways to expand his use of the mediums available to him so that his art encompasses many forms as it did in the quilt he made for his teacher.

Whatever his art takes him, it will be beautifully constructed and colorful.