Quilt It Wright - Part V The Finished Quilt

Quilt It Wright 

My improv quilt process inspired by the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright

Part I HERE Inspiration

Part II HERE Piecing the top

Part III HERE Quilting

Part IV HERE Faced Binding

50" x 60"

The top is all Oakshott cottons

Batting is two layers of Hobbs black wool / poly blend

Quilting threads are Aurifil

2610 Light Blue Grey 28wt

2715 Robins Egg 28 wt

4140 Wedgewood Blue 40 wt

2784 Dark Navy 40 wt

Bobbin thread Aurifil 2600 Dove 50 wt

Why did I add the green in the middle?  

Well, one reason is that I've learned it's good to have a place in your quilt for the eyes to stop and focus, something not overwhelming, but a small pop.  

I may have intended in the beginning to add more greens to the whole piece. 

Or maybe I had no reason, except that the color was blended in with the blues and I liked it.

My helper

Fallingwater

What I noticed about Fallingwater is the sweep of the eye.  You look up and center, with the chimneys, then your eyes sweep right, down and left.  

I attempted to do the same with the movement in the quilt

Center up, right, down, left

I loved putting together this quilt, I had the idea in mind for many months before I could start, and once I did start not everything went according to my plan.  The beauty of inspiration and improv is that you can change your plans along the way and make something even more beautiful than what you originally imagined.

Thank you for following along on my process of bringing to life 

Quilt It Wright

Journey

I named this quilt Journey for a few reasons - and after trying for almost a week to photograph it, I almost wanted to call it 'Journey of rain, weeds, poison ivy, too sunny, and unavailable tall quilt holders'

I don't have many progress photos on this one, they were taken late at night, with my phone, and look crappy, so I'm not even going to bother with those.  You just get to see the finished project!

I'm a big fan of the Chambray collection by Andover Fabrics, and the background on this one is printed Chambray by Alison Glass, from the Ex Libris collection.  I found the background color difficult to photograph, the color wanted to blend into any outdoor setting. 

I did a little journeying around to find a couple of spots I thought the quilt would fit into.

Journey measures 84" x 71" - I needed to very tall holders.  Luckily, my son and future son in law are well over 6' (they come in handy and usually are good sports about these shoots).  Although the poison ivy and possibility of snakes in this area had them watching their toes.

I wanted to talk about my journey with quilting, but I am still putting together my thoughts.  I will post again with a narrative of why I wanted to name this quilt, with a few close up photos of the quilting, those didn't happen today.  I was lucky to get these guys after work with enough light and no rain for these photos. 

The printed fabric is Handcrafted by Alison Glass, the first collection.  There will be a new collection of Handcrafted coming out soon.

Quilted with Aurifil #2975 Brass in 28 wt, bobbin thread Aurifil #2600 Dove (my favorite color) in 50 wt.  The quilt top was 88" x 74"  after quilting it is now 84" x 71"  who knows what will happen after washing!

Tokyo Subway Map

Sometimes I make a quilt top with no idea how to quilt it, or what I'm going to do with the quilt.  Sometimes I just make the quilt top because I want to.  

I completed this top a few years ago, couldn't decide how to quilt it, or what to do about borders, so I  put it away.  Here is the post when I actually finished the top. I think there are 1600 2" squares in this top, it's a beautiful colorful pattern.

I came across the top about a month ago in my search for a Kona bundle (that I know I own, and still can't find) and knew immediately some matchstick quilting would be just the thing, and borders schmorders, who needs borders. But first I needed a back and maybe a huge label.

And some help with the basting (teach them young)

So here we are all nice and crinkly from washing, with a huge label so everyone knows her name. 

I quilted with 4 different Aurifil colors in a crosshatch pattern, not really a pattern though, I just quilted as I felt an area needed more.  Actually it's hard to stop matchsticking once you start, I want to do the whole thing, I made myself leave open spaces for this quilt, but I also tried to have every square touched with quilting. 

The Tokyo Subway Map pattern is available in Oh, Fransson (Elizabeth Hartman) website.  

I am pleased that I waited to quilt this until I had the perfect idea for quilting.  I know some people don't like to have incomplete projects, but I have to have the right feelings about a quilt to work on it.  Whether it's piecing or quilting, my interest needs to be piqued.  And now I have a beautiful finished quilt!

Sunprint Quilt

I am so happy to finally be able to show the entire quilt I made using Alison Glass Sunprint 2015 Collection.  I used a piece of each fabric in the collection.  The background fabric is Andover Fabrics Chambray in Grey.  

'Fruit Flavors'

The block I used is a paper pieced block called Fractal Block by Patty Solanger and is available for download in her Craftsy shop. 

Progress photos can be found here

The background Chambray Grey is quilted with Aurifil thread - #1133 Bright Orange and #2240 Rusty Orange.  Each color block was quilted with Aurifil 40 wt in a matching color.  

I used Sunprint Ink in Paper color (white with black dots) for the binding, I used a machine binding technique for the binding. 

The quilting is termed 'matchstick quilting'.  The quilting lines are densely sewn - 1/8" or closer.  (Thank you to Leanne of She Can Quilt for introducing me to this style of quilting!)

'Fruit Flavors' finished up at 46" x 65" before washing

It was pretty windy while trying to get these photos done - my thanks to Shelley (@brookquilt1) for helping out

Mary

Finishing Touches

I admit it, I have a problem finishing projects.  Before I'm barely started with one, the next one is calling me out.  I have more ideas, fabric, drawings, patterns and tools that are waiting to be used.  

One of the reasons I like making bags, pillows, and minis is that they are projects that are finished quickly so my ADD doesn't kick into overdrive before I can get the small item finished.

One of the things I'm slow to do unless there is a deadline is the binding.  I had a quilt sit for 3 years with no binding.  Then when I added the binding it took all of about an hour (I usually machine bind).

This wall hanging just lacked the binding for 3 months, and then it was probably only finished because it was intended for my granddaughter's nursery and she was due to arrive.

I'm not one of those people who neatly roll their binding on to an old spool or something.  It just lays there in a puddle, waiting to be added

And voila it's finished, even added a label (another thing I often don't get to, but I'm trying to be better at)

And up on the nursery wall

The bed skirt matches the Elephant wall hanging

Nursery sewing I have to say, is quite rewarding.  I love to dress up the room with color

Keep Calm and Quilt On!

Mary

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

Fields

I started this quilt over a year ago as part of a challenge.

I had an assortment of Kona solids, prints, Shot Cottons, linen, and Oakshott cottons

I wanted an improv pieced quilt and I played with my layout for a month

Progress photos 

Improv is not for everyone, some don't like lack of guidelines, planning, or straight seams.  It doesn't have to be that way, you can add your own guidelines - making blocks that are 12 1/2" or keeping all seams going in one direction.  For this quilt I did a lot of sewing, then cutting, then sewing back together to get an effect I was happy with.

Eventually this quilt top began to remind me of the fields we see flying.  While not too high in the  sky, when you look down the land is a pattern of fields and forests.  Until you get to a city - but that will have to be a different quilt.

The forested areas look boxed in by the pattern of fields from the air, and there are a myriad of colors represented in the forest areas as well as the field strips.

After starting the quilting on this top,  I was put off by the tedious quilting pattern I had chosen, I was matchstick quilting before I knew that was what it was called! Other projects and deadlines were calling me, so I put this one away.

Earlier in the week I pulled this out and decided to finish the quilting so I could submit the quilt for consideration in an exhibit.  I had kept all the threads I had pulled for quilting together as well as the extra fabrics.  The miracle was that I knew where the quilt was, I knew where the threads were, and I knew where the fabrics were.

I pulled out new threads to add to the pile, not all threads were used, but some threads matched fabrics perfectly

So I quilted and quilted and quilted (remembering why I had put this away) for 3 days, changing color threads, going back when I came across an area I had missed.  There are a million starts and stops, and a million threads to trim up.  

Binding from left over fabrics

Now it's done and its submitted.  Whether or not it is chosen for the exhibit, I took the step of entering.  It's scary having your work, something you are passionate about, spent time and energy making, judged by others as worthy or not. 

Fields

61" x 40"

Kona Solids, linen, Shot Cottons, Oakshott cottons, cotton prints

Cotton/Wool 50/50 Matilda Batting

Aurifil, Superior, and King Tut threads

Keep Calm and Quilt On!

Mary