Monthly Archives: June 2013

A Quilt for A Man

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Last weekend was Father’s Day, so it’s time to start thinking of a quilt to be made for the appropriate man for NEXT Father’s Day.  Here are some man-quilt ideas (modern, of course).

  • Make it big enough to cover him for a nap.  60” x 72” is about right but modify depending on his size.
  • It doesn’t have to be in dark “masculine” colors; consider his favorite colors.  If he likes yellow, a yellow and black quilt will still look masculine (just don’t make it yellow duckies).
  • There are a lot of fun novelty fabrics appropriate to masculine interests—everything from Alexander Henry’s pinup girls to power tools, beer, and many more.
  • To use stash, consider simple patterns that make interesting abstract designs.  For example, Yellow Brick Road is an easy pattern that can use up a good amount of stash.  Start with 1 to 1-1/2 yards of focus fabric and add enough fat quarters of other fabrics to make your quilt.  Make enough blocks to leave off the border and it instantly looks more modern.
  • Plaids or flannels (or plaid flannels!) make good man-quilts
  • Save old shirts, pants, or jeans and make a quilt of them
  • Of course, you can always just let him choose from among the quilts you’ve already made.  My husband saw this one when I was piecing it and asked for it! I was very pleased that he liked it, so of course it is his now!

Modern Donation Quilt

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Donation quilts are a great use for scraps, but they aren’t usually very exciting to make.  I make them more interesting by trying something new with each quilt.  

Most donation quilts are smaller than bed size, which makes them a good place to try new things.  Here’s an example where I “tweaked” the usual quilt design in several ways to make it more modern while still using older fabric from my stash.

First, this is a typical donation quilt. usual donation labelled It’s made 40″ x 40″ as requested by the charity, and it used up a fair number of those 5” charm squares that seem to reproduce themselves while the fabric closet door is closed. I used it to practice some of the quilting designs I’m learning in Leah Day’s Craftsy class, so I did learn something in making it.

And here’s what I decided to do on the next donation quilt for a children’s charity to make it more modern.  Ronald Labelled

I made these changes to made this design more modern:

  1. The blocks are rectangles rather than squares.  It didn’t use up any charm squares, but it did use come cute fabric I’ve had for a while.
  2. I found a nice coordinating almost-solid in my stash.  (Solids are commonly used in modern quilts.)
  3. The rows run vertically and are offset by a half block starting alternate rows.  This breaks up the usual march of blocks across the quilt, making a diagonal zigzag pattern.  It doesn’t hurt that the quilt also is easier to construct because there are no corners to match 😉
  4. The quilt was designed without a border.

If you’d like to make a quilt like this, I’ve made a separate page with instructions; click on this link.  If you make a quilt from this, send me a picture!