Tag Archives: modern quilt

Quilt Design 4: Choosing your color scheme

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Of all the things people think they need help with, color is mentioned most often. Indeed, color can be complicated if you want to make it that way, but my preference is to make it simple. So here goes…

quilt design

Example 1: Purple Quilt

A good starting place is your favorite color. You don’t have to think too much about what that is. So start with your favorite color and then add colors that you like to see with it. Never mind that stuff about analogous color schemes being restful and complementary color schemes being lively. Yes, they are true, but if you do it that way you’re likely over-thinking it. If YOU like the color scheme, then go for it!  I love purple, so that’s what I chose for this first example.  I like gold with it, and the thought process was “I like gold with it so I’ll use it” rather than, “Gold is complementary to purple so I’ll use it.”  However, if knowing it’s complementary helps you, by all means use that framework.  I chose a grey background fabric because grey is “good this year”, as my Mother would have put it.

But let’s assume you want a color scheme kind of worked out in advance.  A common piece of advice is to pick a print as your feature fabric and then choose your coordinates from the colors in the feature print. That works fine, but it assumes you want a multi-color print as the focal point of your quilt.

One of thousands of color schemes all ready to use at Design-Seeds.com

One of thousands of color schemes all ready to use at Design-Seeds.com

There are lots of other ways that work at least as well. Color schemes are everywhere you look, and they’ve already been worked out by many design experts, from Mother Nature to New York City advertising specialists. Flip through a favorite magazine and choose an ad with colors that appeal to you. Take a snapshot of something pretty and use the colors you see there. Go to design-seeds.com to view thousands of color combinations.  You can subscribe to a free daily e-mail featuring some of them. Start a Pinterest board where you save color combinations that appeal to you. Above all, have confidence in your own judgment: If YOU like it, that’s good enough!

modern quilt

Color scheme is from a visit to southern New Mexico

Now, go practice by finding some color schemes you like and designing quilts with them. As always, designing on paper counts!  And if this wasn’t enough information about color to suit you, don’t worry–I’ll be saying lots more later!

The year so far…

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Oops!  It’s the end of June already, so half way through 2014!  Therefore, here are pictures of a few of the things I’ve done so far:

scrap quilt

Quilt Alliance Challenge 2014

Dotty-Stripes-Detail

Detail of a quilt I submitted to an IQF contest

Next is the June “finish”.  I’ve been sending a finish every month to Aunt Marti at 52quilts because I need the motivation of her challenge to get some of my UFOs (Unfinished Objects) cleaned up!  As you can see, this is pieced but not quilted; Aunt Marti let’s YOU decide what qualifies as “finished”!  And after 2 years staring at these HSTs (half square triangles), I think putting them together into a top for a donation quilt qualifies as “finished”!  So if you need motivation to finish some of your UFOs, click the link above and head over to her blog 🙂

pieced quilt top

Donation quilt top is the finish for June!

improvisationally pieced quilt

In Fairyland, entered in the Vermont Quilt Festival

Swap Block–88 little squares!!!
Swap Block
improv pieced quilt

Improv 9 Patch for Ronald McDonald House

As always, 20% of the projects took 80% of the time!  So it’s good to have the little pouches and swap blocks to be done relatively quickly!  What have you been up to?

Three Reasons to Love Pinterest

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modern quilt

Delightful quilt from CutToPieces.blogspot.com

I started using Pinterest a while back at the urging of my daughter, and have found it invaluable.  It replaces at least 3 scrapbooks/notebooks that have been floating around my house for years.

First, of course, Pinterest is great for quilting ideas!  When I find something I love, I don’t have to bookmark it or add it to favorites to be able to find it again.  I just pin it to one of my Pinterest boards–maybe Quilt Ideas, or Good Quilt Photos, or Design.  Then when I wonder, “Now where did I see that great quilt?” I can flip through my Pinterest boards and find the picture, which in turn has the link to where it was found.  This saves a LOT of fooling around looking for things on the internet and replaces the lists I had to keep previously.  It’s even partially replaced the notebooks full of clippings I’ve kept for years.

pieced modern quilt

T-Perspective by Linda Rotz Miller

Second, Pinterest is great for finding other quilters, their blogs, etc.  For example, I found the Cut To Pieces blog shown above because I admired one of the quilts from the blog I found on Pinterest.  But there’s more!  When you find someone whose taste is similar to yours (based on the pins you find from him/her), you can “follow” that person or just some of that person’s boards on Pinterest and get lots of great new pictures that he/she found.  For example, I found the picture here on the Pinterest page of Tricia Royal, a quilt artist from Chicago, so now I follow several of her boards.  You can also follow your friends’ boards to see what they’re pinning.  In fact, if you see something they’re pinning it may give you an idea of what they’d like to have for the next birthday!

modern quilt

Terrific design from Melody Johnson Quilts

Finally, you can simply search Pinterest when you need inspiration.  By putting “modern quilts”, “colors”, “art quilts”, or whatever into Pinterest’s search box, I’ve found many, many fun ideas.  It’s a great amusement in waiting rooms, while enjoying a second cup of coffee, or when in need of new ideas.  As a commercial for a product I’ve long forgotten used to say:  “Try it–you’ll like it!”

What to do with Beautiful Fabric?

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I’ve been a fan of Moda’s Wildflowers collections of fabric for quite a while, not only because they are beautiful florals, but because they look just like spring in central Texas, where I used to live.Drunk-detail

Although this picture was taken to show the quilting done by my long-arm friend, you can see several of the beautiful flowers and get the idea.

But as always when I buy a piece of fabric I really love, the question is what to do with it that does it justice.  I finally had a brainstorm when working on a border designed by Karla Alexander for one of her stack-and-shuffle quilts.  It involved cutting gentle curves through several layers of fabric and then shuffling the layers before assembling the pieces.  Drunk-in-the-Garden

I chose some gold to go with my floral and cut large squares.  Then I cut curves in them freehand, shuffled, and sewed them together.

This quilt is called “Drunk in the Garden” and is intended to give the impression of a moonlit walk through the Texas hill country in spring.  Nature walks don’t go in a straight line, so the golden paths through the quilt don’t go in a straight line.  I threw in “drunk” because that comes to mind before “nature walk” when you see this wiggly path!

Best of all, I was able to use large sections of the floral fabric to show it off.

What have you done with favorite fabrics?

 

Your Inner Designer 3: New Blocks From Old

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There is almost never anything new in design; indeed, the best designs probably are made with a sense of history.  So far we’ve modified overall quilt designs to make new ones; this time we’re going to modify blocks.  So here we go: 1.  Stretch it:

pieced star quilt

Quilt made with Block 3

pieced star quilt

Quilt made with Block 4

2.  Tilt it, or stretch and tilt it:

pieced quilt

This quilt is made from Block 1, tilted, with half the blocks tilted the other way

3.  Cut it and shuffle the pieces; rotate them if you like:

pieced quilt

This quilt is made from block 7, with the blocks rotated various ways to make the pattern

4.  Cut it and insert something.  This will distort the block and you’ll have to trim to make it even:

pieced star quilt

Quilt made from Block 10 and a plain block with strips inserted the same way

All of this fooling around might be a good use for some of those orphan blocks–what have you got to lose?  And If you find some modifications you really like, try them out in a quilt: Please make some designs and send them to me–I’d love to see what you come up with!

Two Favorite Quilt Patterns

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I love designing quilts and making my own designs, but I also enjoy making quilts from outstanding designs by other people.  I thought I’d list a couple of my favorites, and I hope you’ll let me know (in the comments) what some of your favorites are, too.

star quilt

A floral quilt made from Lucky Stars by Atkinson Designs

A favorite quilt pattern for me should be striking in appearance, should have foolproof instructions [because I certainly could be a fool on any given day ;-)], and should be something that makes me say, “I wish I’d thought of that!”

Lucky Stars by Atkinson Designs.  This is the first quilt pattern I ever bought, though far from the first quilt I made.  When I started quilting, I just decided what I wanted, drafted the pattern,and then made it.  Buying this pattern was a revelation!  Such great instructions!  Such great results!  And so little effort compared to what I’d been doing!  I’ve made this pattern several times, and the recipients have loved every one of these quilts.  I’ve also used this to teach “Make Your Second Quilt” for advanced beginners, and the students loved it, too.

I LOVE any quilt with concentric boxes, and having them in multiple sizes and bright colors is just the BEST!  This quilt pattern is Outside the Box, by Rose Mason.  I put 4 of these together to make a queen quilt for a friend’s daughter when she got married, and it worked out really well.

Outside the Box, pattern by Rose Mason

Outside the Box, pattern by Rose Mason

 And even that didn’t wear me out on concentric boxes!  I’ve made many more, both from patterns and my own designs. 

Please leave a comment telling me what your favorite patterns are, and I’ll pass along the love in a later post.

Happy Plaids is my own design, but there are MANY similar quilts out there

Happy Plaids is my own design, but there are MANY similar quilts out there

Gallery Show!

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applique art quilt

Leaf, made in class with Laura Wasilowski

The Asheville Modern Quilt Guild is lucky enough to meet in a nice conference room in the building occupied by both the Quilt Alliance and the Handmade in America organization.  Because of those connections (and the quality of our work) we will be having a show of our members’ work at the gallery maintained by Handmade in America.  This is an organization representing craft artists from Western North Carolina (that would be us!) The work they represent is very high quality, so we are thrilled to be invited to display our work in their gallery, located at 125 S. Lexington Avenue in Asheville.  (The entrance is on Hilliard Avenue between Church and S. Lexington.)

I’m including pictures in this post of the works I’m submitting, but I hope any of you whoshow announcement are in the area will come see the show.  It will run April 29 – August 19, with an opening reception 2-4 p.m. on Sunday, May 4.  We have several fine quilters in our group, and they really do make “all kinds of quilts”, as the title of the exhibit suggests.  Please come!

Handmade-3

Improv I, my original design

pieced quilt original design

Bubble Up, my oritinal design

 

 

Quilt Alliance Challenge

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After thinking I would use Sunbonnet Sue as my inspiration,

Fabric scraps

Scraps!

I did a total about-face and chose a scrap quilt instead.  I LOVE scrap quilts, and since I certainly HAVE a lot of scraps, it all works out 🙂

Here’s the process for this year’s Quilt Alliance donation quilt.  I wanted to use tiny scraps and have one tiny star.  I used Electric Quilt (EQ7) to print a foundation pattern for a star that finishes about 3″ square.  The first one I made, using the brand of fabric we’ve all

Paper foundation for star
Foundation pieced star, finishing 3″

depended on for solids, was just a little off.  Turns out the “beefy” thick texture of that fabric doesn’t lend itself well to tiny, tiny points (the center square here is 1/2″ x 1/2″).  So I re-generated the foundation pattern and, as often happens, decided on a little design change at the same time.  Then I made the star using Moda Bella black, which is a lighter weight cloth that folded more crisply in such a small space.

Joining scraps
Scraps
Improvisational piecing

For the rest of the quilt I pulled out my zippy-colored Michael Miller cotton couture scraps and just sewed them together as I took them out of the box.  Eventually I had to cut a few more “scraps” to finish the top.  There were so very MANY seams that I was glad of the lighter weight of this cloth, almost like voile.  It took many days to do this, quite a bit longer than I had expected for a 16″ x 16″ quilt!  The smallest pieces finish about 1/4″ squares or triangles!

scrap quilt

Quilt Alliance Challenge 2014

So here it is!  I would love to count the pieces, but I don’t think I have the energy left to do it!  Besides, who wants to know a thing like that? 😉

Pop-up Show

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quilt show

Asheville Modern Quilt Guild Show

Here are some pictures from the Asheville Modern Quilt Guild’s Pop-up Quilt Show, held Sunday, March 16 at the Folk Art Center on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  We had good attendance and gained several new members!  As you can see, we had some members demonstrating quilt making, as well.  If you missed it, the Guild will have a show at the Handmade in America gallery in Asheville from mid-May through mid-August.  Meanwhile, here are some of our members and their quilts:

First, here’s Diana Kantor with her amazing table runner.  It has 3-D folded flowers and leaves in addition to that beautiful quilted design in the center!

quilted table runner

Diana Kantor

And here’s Erica Kilgo with her very fun Bricks and Bubbles quilt:

modern quilt

Erica Kilgo

Here’s Amy Anderson with three of her beautiful quilts:

modern quilts

Amy Anderson

Here is Connie Brown with some of her amazing art quilts:

art quilts

Connie Brown

Emily and Miriam Coffey weren’t able to be there, so I don’t have their pictures, but here is one of their beautiful quilts:

modern quilt

Emily and Miriam Coffey’s quilt

And of course we had our Opportunity Quilt on display so people could take an interest and maybe even buy tickets:

modern quilt

Asheville Modern Quilt Guild Opportunity Quilt

Hopefully you’ve found these quilts inspiring.  If you’re interested in joining our guild, here is a link to our Facebook page.

Next week I’m starting a series on designing your own quilts.

You may be a modern quilter if…

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I’ve always thought the Amish were the original modern quilters, with their solid fabrics and striking designs.

Amish design quilt

I made this quilt when we lived in Pennsylvania

Still, there is a lot of discussion of the definition of modern quilting, and there are some financial issues at stake because there is (a little) money to be made in quilting.

There are lots of definitions that I like, including the one offered by the Modern Quilt Guild website. Individual modern quilters have their own definitions, too.  I’ll tell you mine at the end, but meanwhile, here’s a list to consider:

You may be a modern quilter if…

…you’ve ever said, “This is the LAST TIME I’m making a quilt with a lot of blocks exactly

36 patch block

I’ve seen quilts like this defined as modern–no kidding!

alike!”

…you like to design quilts inspired by the mid 20th century aesthetic

…you like the look of quilts with a variety of different size blocks

…or you like your quilts with no identifiable individual blocks at all

…you like quilts with lots of negative space

improvisational blocks

Improvisational blocks made from scraps of the quilt shown at the top

…you enjoy working with solid (or almost solid) fabrics

…you often use improvisational piecing

…you like to challenge yourself to create something new rather than following a pattern …you are drawn to “low volume” fabric with a lot of background showing

Here’s my first stab at a definition:   Modern quilting is about good design first.  Many traditional quilts are good designs, but the emphasis is too often on how many tedious piecing techniques can be used perfectly.  Modern quilts are more like “modern” art–technique must be good, but design is paramount.

Finally, of course, you’re a modern quilter if YOU SAY you are!  You get to define yourself.