#equalityquilt: Day 5

Yesterday was the last day of the residency and it was a blast. There was 70 contributions left to create, to achieve the 254 hexagons that will represent all the MPs that voted against same sex marriage and we made it! Just as the museum closed! I'm really pleased we reached this target - in my mind I would have been happy with achieving 150 contributions but to get all 254 was outstanding. The work will be up until the 14 September if you are around Manchester and want to take a look-please do!

 This would not have been possible without the dedicated support of a LGBT youth North West who brought young people in to help make these remaining messages. People still came by and some of them took part but I think having so many people around the table may have appeared intimating which lead to less of the passers by taking part. There were still young people and groups who weren't phased by the presence of the others. This might be because young people are fearless sometimes especially when an opportunity to get involved in craft takes over. Regarding groups, like this group from France were interested in the project and curious to get involved. 

I think because the size of their group meant they were less intimated by the others. Also I was able to explain it was the last day and their contributions would help me reach the final target. They all appeared to really enjoy it and were taking pictures of themselves with there contributions. They seemed to really enjoy taking part.

 What was great about having the LGBT youth North West team there is that they were able to help create all the additional contributions from twitter. This really helped getting the last 30 contributions together having the time pressure and an end goal really helped to motivate everyone as a group. 

 These are a few of the contributions they all made, I think towards the end they got a little rushed but in a way I like the outcome, they will add to the overall presence of the work. Having access to music and food kept everyone going and a nice informal buzz as we made the final pieces. The work helped us all bond and learn more about each other which was really uplifting.

  This is one contribution I wanted to complete myself by my friend and colleague Clare Andrews. She is pro same sex marriage and Christian. After the previous conversation I had with the mother who was against same sex marriage I really wanted to profile this statement.  Unfortunately the person who completed it also missed out one of the three things when they wrote it, it's missing-faith. I will have to amend it. It should read:  "Three things will last forever- faith, hope and love- and the greatest of these is love" 1 Corinthians 13:13 

 This contribution is just brilliant, it was a twitter contribution from another friend and colleague Davinia Jokhi and the message was created by Catherine O'Donnell who helped out in the afternoon. 

 These were the last standing in the final hour that made it all happen big thanks to them all Catherine, Gordan, Heather and Panda there were also two who were camera shy Sam a Kale but their help was really valuable and deserve recognizing. 

 So here it is, the final outcome all 254 contributions are on the wall. Later in the year I'll be incorporating these images into the quilt it's great to have gone through the week and met so many different people and gain insights to their personality through making these messages together. It's been a really rich and rewarding experience in so many ways. I'm incredibly grateful to Catherine O'Donnell and the public who contributed and voted for me and helped support me go on this journey. I'm indebted to People's History Museum for enabling me to complete this project and it's given me great opportunities to lead on to enable the project to go further. I'm ready to take the project to the next stage and get the public to take part in decorating the 396 MPs that voted for same sex marriage in order to bring all these images together and make this quilt happen!