08/01/2025
Conversations on the Couch
Cathy Fussel, FIBER ARTIST & RETIRED TEACHER
We visited Fussell on a warm Saturday afternoon at her studio that she shares with husband, Fred, at the Lofts at Swift Mill. We learned about her path from being an English teacher to creating her highly detailed quilts of art after retirement.
Tell us about your early life.
I was born in Louisiana and grew up in Buena Vista, Georgia. I went to the University of Georgia and then transferred to Georgia State because I wanted to study folklore with John Burrison. I majored in English and education with a focus in folklore. I didn’t want to teach right then so I got a job at Westville in Lumpkin in Stewart County.
I come from a long line of women who sewed and took great pride and pleasure in their sewing. In Buena Vista, the women in the community made clothing and swapped patterns and materials and ideas. My mother was just really into that. She started me sewing when I was four years old. I really started sewing in earnest in high school. I graduated from high school in ‘67, so I caught that wave of the crafts revival and the back to the earth movement. It was great fun. My girlfriends and l in college were just so into crocheting and knitting and all that stuff.
Read more here: https://issuu.com/columbusandthevalley.com/docs/july_august_2025_columbus_and_the_valley/66
