At first glance, Aparna Ewing’s life seemed destined for science. Trained in biomedical research and computer science, she spent decades working in laboratories and developing scientific software. But beneath the precision of data and technology was a lifelong love of color, fabric, and design waiting to emerge. Today, the walls of her home are filled with vibrant art quilts that transform cloth into bold personal expression—proof that creativity can flourish at any stage of life.
When Aparna Ewing bought her house on Hermann Street in 1992, she was in charge of scientific software at a biotech company. After graduating from the pre-med program at UC Berkeley, she worked in biomedical research at Stanford, UC San Francisco, and the Salk Institute.
She moved back to her hometown of La Jolla to work as a lab supervisor at the Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation. Her engineer father had taught her early on not to be afraid of mathematics and learning new things. There, she took courses at UC San Diego to study computer science, which landed her a job back in the Bay Area.
Although Aparna loved biomedical science and software, she felt that she had always been looking for her own artistic expression. Her mother had imparted to her a love of color, and she had sewn her own clothes for fun growing up. As an adult, Aparna had tried collage, but in 1998, she saw an art quilt in a store and decided that would be her art form.
She joined the East Bay Heritage Quilters where she took classes in kaleidoscope quilting and learned other skills such as dyeing fabrics. Although she continued to work full time in the sciences until age 57, she found several hours every evening to work on her quilts – not as bedspreads, but rather as wall hangings known as “art quilts.”
When she retired in 2004, Aparna was able to spend more time on her quilts. “To get inspiration, I look at hundreds of quilts online. I start with colors and fabrics I want to use. Sometimes I do a series of quilts, as I did with 20 quilts using text, which I call Text Messages. Or I pick a theme, as I did during COVID with my Corona quilt. All my quilts are my original designs.”
Aparna decided that art quilts were to be her chosen art form.
Today, Aparna estimates that she has about 50 quilts in her house, 17 of them hanging on her walls. She has sold several quilts, but admits to giving away more to friends. Last December and January, she had them displayed at Bay Quilts, a show in Richmond.
Most of her quilts are 24 x 30 inches and can take between 25 and 100 hours to complete. For the past 16 years, she has worked together with fellow quilter (and best friend) at her friend’s home in Lodi.
When she’s not quilting, Aparna and her husband, Damo, take long walks in Rockridge, travel, and meditate. They share a dog named Dash, cats named Zooey and Freddie, and 35 rose bushes. While now in her late 70s, Aparna is only slowing down a bit. Genes are on her side, as her 101-year-old mother still lives on her own in Southern California.
