Wood Lily

in*spi*ra*tion

:something that makes someone want to do something or that gives someone an idea about what to do or create : a force or influence that inspires someone

For an upcoming meeting with the Virginia Beach Modern Quilt Guild we have a challenge, take the block #110 from The Farmers Wife Sampler Quilt and make a modern version.  Wood Lily is the block name, and we are to make a 24" mini quilt. (If you want to have a look, there are some photos on Pinterest and Google Images, but I don't want to post anyone else's photo of the block without their permission.)

After looking at a few different images of the Wood Lily block, I settled on two elements, the half square triangle and flying geese blocks which are present in the original.  This is an inspiration exercise, I only wanted to work with those two parts of the whole, and see where I could take it.  

I started with a drawing on graph paper

At the time I was working on my modern variation of Wood Lily, I was also reading Savor Each Stitch by Carolyn Friedlander Yep, I was reading a quilting book instead of just looking at the photos.  The section of the book about contrast in value inspired me to think more about the name of the block 'Wood Lily' and think of the contrast in those two words 'wood' and 'lily'.  One is dark and robust, one is soft and smooth.  

Taking those 2 contrasting words I transferred them into fabric color

Making flying geese blocks

Progressing with all the small geese

The small flying geese are 1" x 3" finished.  

Both sections of this mini use the two elements I chose from the original Wood Lily block, half square triangles and flying geese.  I have seen a few examples of other VBMQG members minis and I think it's a good exercise to see where each person finds their inspiration.

Commencing with the quilting

This one needed squaring up after the dense quilting of the lily sections

While I was working through the different steps of concept, drawing, fabric selections, and piecing what came to mind was a dense forest seen from the air with surrounding snow fields.  

This mini finished at about 23 1/4" a bit smaller than 24" due to the dense quilting, I'll need to keep that in mind for future quilts.  

Kaffe Fasset and Brandon Mably prints in the dark wood sections, Kona solids in the snowy lily sections.  Quilted with Aurifil threads.  

Keep Calm and Quilt On!

Mary