When he was a child, Richard Larson's mother gave him a needle, thread and buttons to keep him busy. By the time he was in high school, he sewed so well he earned spending money by making prom dresses. Then he went to fashion school and designed women's eveningwear.

NATALIE CAUDILL/DMN

Nelson Berry (from left), Richard Larson and Jack Brockette show some of their quiltwork at Mr. Larson's Quilting Design Studio in Plano.

But it took him several decades to find a more expressive way to use his sewing machine: quilting.

"My whole dream was to be a fashion designer," Mr. Larson says. "Then I discovered quilting. I thought, 'This is much better.' It's much more individualistic."

Now, he owns his own place, Quilting Design Studio in Plano, and in March he chaired the Dallas Quilt Celebration, an all-volunteer show with more than 350 quilts on display. He's also among the small minority of male quilters in a hobby – and a profession – that has been dominated by women.

"There are a lot of closet men quilters," says Mr. Larson, 51, of Carrollton. "You hear about football players knitting, but they don't want people to know about it. That's the same way with quilting, because it's always been a girl thing. Well, it's not a girl thing anymore."

There have always been male quilters, though, says Judy Schwender, curator of collections of the Museum of the American Quilter's Society in Paducah, Ky. After the Civil War, veterans who lost their legs in battle often took up quilting, she says. In the 1930s, male quilters were in the spotlight when Albert Small sewed a quilt with what is believed to be the largest number of pieces, with each square inch containing more than 15 tiny hexagons.

Now, male quilters come from the same backgrounds as female quilters, with engineers, doctors, dentists and former teachers among them. Unlike women, though, men tend to begin quilting only after retiring from their career, says Scott Murkin, an Asheboro, N.C., doctor, quilter and professional quilt judge who judged the Dallas Quilt Celebration this year.

"A lot of people think it takes patience to be a quilter, but what it really takes is persistence," Mr. Murkin says. "People in the medical field and in the education field are used to breaking things into small steps, having small goals and staying on a focused track."

That was the case for Jack Brockette, who made his first quilt in 1984 after retiring from teaching in the Dallas Independent School District. An art teacher who studied fibers at the Rhode Island School of Design and enjoys weaving, Mr. Brockette said it took him five years to "get serious about it" with quilting. When he did, he began entering quilt shows and teaching workshops across the country, especially on the stipple quilting technique, which involves using tiny stitches over the body of the quilt.

He returned to teaching in 1993, in Irving, and designed a school quilting program that was recognized by the National Gallery of Art. While quilters say the look of a quilt depends on the style of the quilter – and not their gender – Mr. Brockette, 70, says the boys he taught were more inclined to focus on the mathematics of quiltmaking and the technical aspects of planning its pattern and measurements.

"Those boys created a competitive atmosphere," he says. "It was like, 'I'm going to get my quilt finished before you.' They would come in before school and after school. One even asked to take a $5,000 sewing machine home for the weekend."

The geometry and the mechanics of quilting also attracted Nelson Berry. He visited the fabric store with his wife, a seamstress, and the two made regular trips to quilt exhibits at the State Fair of Texas. But after starting to quilt five years ago, Mr. Berry, 69, of Dallas, now takes some salespeople by surprise. In Austin, one fabric store clerk pointed him toward a row of chairs and suggested he sit down and rest.

"I just blew up," he says. "I found the owner on the way out of the store and said he needed to talk with the salespeople. You cannot judge a book by the cover."

But those experiences are rare, he says. "Many times, they assume I am shopping for my wife. But when I tell them no, I am the one doing the quilting, they say 'Oh, I am so pleased. I wish my husband did that.' "

"They just don't expect it," he says.

Kate Goodloe is a New York freelance writer.

Quilting Design Studio 624 Haggard St., Plano www.qdstudio.com

Quilter's Guild of Dallas www.quiltersguildofdallas.org