Tag Archives: modern quilts

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!

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!

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

 

 

Auction!

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Remember that quilt I made to donate to the Alliance for American Quilts “TWENTY” contest?  If not, you can see a section of it as the header for my blog, and you can read about it here.Rising Star for Web

In any case, the time has come!  The TWENTY entries have travelled to shows around the country and are now up for auction on eBay.  The group that includes my quilt will be auctioned starting at 9:00 EST (U.S.) tomorrow night.

I’ve been happy to learn about the Quilt Alliance over the past few months.  I originally donated a quilt because I liked the idea of the TWENTY challenge and I’m always donating quilts to various causes—who isn’t?  However, I’ve since learned that the Alliance has several missions I’m especially happy to support:

  • They promote awareness of quilting as a grassroots American art form
  • They document quilts so their stories aren’t lost, and encourage all quilters to document their work
  • They make their information available to the public through various forums, including an association with The University of Texas at Austin (where I went to school)

The Quilt Alliance has numerous projects to further their goals, and their staff are some of the nicest people I’ve encountered.  They have a fun blog that presents quilts from various periods in history, and you can subscribe by e-mail so you get to see different quilts from their records.

Check out the Quilt Alliance website and then check out the Ebay auction.  You may become a Quilt Alliance fan, too!

Oh, yes, and bid on the quilts.  Most of them are by people a lot more famous than I am  😉  You might enjoy going to the Ebay site just to look at the quilts!

Improving My Quilt Pix

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OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Another version of “Turning Twenty Again”, this time with my improvisational border

So, this is what a typical picture of one of my quilts has looked like in the past:  Yes, that’s my husband’s head, and the edge of the rug in the TV room…well, you get the idea.  And in fairness, most of these pictures were taken years before I ever thought of having a blog and publishing them.  Let’s just say they’re less than perfect!

Since I started the blog, I’ve tried to improve the old pictures with editing software.  Most of the quilts are long gone to friends, customers, or both, so I don’t have the originals to make new photographs.  After photo editing, the quilts were a bit easier to see, but the photos still weren’t exactly professional looking!  See below.

This is a slight variation on Birthday Presents, by Atkinson Designs; it made a great baby quilt

This is a slight variation on Birthday Presents, by Atkinson Designs; it made a great baby quilt

I looked at a LOT of quilt pics on Flickr; most weren’t any better than mine.  I looked at books and catalogs.  The best quilt portraits I found were in the Keepsake Quilting catalog.  They showed the quilts in nice settings, not just a straight-on picture of the quilt.  I like this approach because it shows the mood of the quilt, not just the design.

Concentric Squares Batik

I love batiks and love making variations on concentric squares, so I enjoyed making this quilt

I started trying to make better “quilt portraits”, showing more than just a straight-on shot of the quilt.  I’ve found that a picture taken with the recipient is very nice.  This next picture was sent to me by a friend who bought one of my quilts as a gift.  Although it is clearly a snapshot rather than a professional photo, I think it does a nice job of being a portrait of the quilt (and the recipient).  It has personality, which is lacking in the straight-on shots even if they show the whole quilt better.

I’m off to make some quilt portraits of my own, having learned a thing or two that I hope will improve the shots for my blog.  Check back next week and see what you think of my “quilt portraits”.