They push their needles through layers of fabric, again and again, creating squares and circles of color that ultimately mesh into a visual symphony: a handmade quilt. Week after week, nearly a dozen quilters meet during their lunch hour to perfect their artistic creations.
 Perla Rothenberg, right, shows Linda Klein some of her handiwork on a quilt destined for City of Hope patients. (Photo by p.cunningham) |
After all their hard work, they do what comes naturally: They give their quilts away. They will never know their recipients, but they know the pieces will share love — and be loved.
For a full year, the quilters of the law firm Irell & Manella create quilts destined for City of Hope patients, completing them all in time for the winter holidays. Six quilters recently delivered bags full of new, colorful pieces to the Sheri & Les Biller Patient and Family Resource Center.
“Our patients will love these,” said Linda Klein, manager of operations for the Biller Patient and Family Resource Center, who coordinates the quilts’ distribution to patients. “They truly are a special gift, and we are sincerely grateful to the quilters for their thoughtfulness and generosity of time and spirit.”
It is the seventh year of sewing for the group, which produced more blankets than ever. “We brought 32 quilts this year. We upped the ante,” said Perla Rothenberg, legal secretary with the law firm.
Some are brightly colored and floral; others feature sports or animal themes. The quilters drew on a variety of fabrics to ensure that men, women, children and teenagers all were covered.
Patients began receiving their quilts over the last several weeks. “The work on the quilt is absolutely beautiful,” wrote one patient in thanks. “I shall cherish it always.”
Irell & Manella has generously given to City of Hope. Its $10 million in gifts to the institution have endowed a chair for the cancer center, renamed the graduate school as the Irell & Manella Graduate School of Biological Sciences and created a visiting professorship. Irell & Manella partner Morgan Chu, J.D., Ph.D., and his wife, Helen Chu, also have donated $5 million to endow the dean’s chair for the graduate school and the directorship of Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope.
