The Best of the Best

Morris Strawberry Thief. Designed by Christine Little from a William Morris design and hooked by Lynn Ruedger, Steger, Illinois, 2008.

Each year, Celebration readers look forward to voting for their favorite Celebration winners, the crowd-pleasing favorites chosen from the 60 finalists and honorable mention rugs. It is a distinct pleasure for us here at RHM to see all the Celebration entries, but perhaps the most enjoyable part of our Celebration year is the Readers' Choice balloting. This is when the rug hooking public speaks out and chooses what we have come to think of as the all-time favorites.

Traditionally, our summertime issue presents the first, second, and third place Readers' Choice awards in each of the three categories: original, commercial, and adaptation. This year the competition was stiff indeed. While the first place winner in each category frequently captures an overwhelming number of votes, this year was a little different. Only a handful of votes separated the three winners in the original category. Every day, when the ballots arrived, we waited to see which of the three would be on top—however temporarily. The favorite changed day by day, week by week. So when you look at the winners, remember just how close the voting was; indeed, all three are first-class rugs.

This article is from the June/July/August 2010 issue. For more information on our issues, check out our issues page.