Clik here to view.
Floating the Squares
Hello! I’m glad you’re here today because I’m excited to show you my finished quilt top! (It’s the first one I’ve made following an improv quilting ‘score’ from Sherri Lynn Wood’s book The Improv Handbook for Modern Quilters by Sherri Lynn Wood.) I’m still rather unimaginatively calling it ‘Floating the Squares‘, but I think I’m in love! It took me a while to figure out the last section with so little fabric left – that’s one way to force yourself to improvise. I knew it wouldn’t get much bigger in size and wanted to make sure it was balanced and flowing.
Clik here to view.
Development of the ‘bottom’ section (the quilt is hanging up the other way on the wall)
Someone suggested that the large pink square on the left hand side in the picture above stood out too much, but that’s one of my favourite areas! He suggested that was because of the orange!!! I can’t deny I love orange and I like the way the ‘path’ skirts around the square (and the way the same (smaller) shape is almost repeated on the adjacent edge), but what I love most is the way the eye is drawn to that side and takes the focal point away from the expected centre. I think I might draw the eye to it even more when it comes to quilting it. I’ve got to get some of my other projects quilted first though!
Colour
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Pastel drawing and the quilt top
When I tacked it to the wall in the sitting room I was surprised by the similarity in colours between the landscape sketch I’d propped up on top of the radiator and the quilt. Strong blues, reds and orange, a slick of green. Seeing the connection made me think about how I use colours to evoke place, and what else I could experiment with to evoke that in a quilt. Shape, texture, maybe pattern. Improv quilting is the way to explore further and I’m keen to move on. I wondered what I could learn from someone else’s approach to improv quilting but even after just this one experiment I’d say that what it does is broaden your thinking. Making something in a way that’s characteristic of someone else’s practice isn’t where I plan to end up, it’s where I plan to begin. I have strong images in my mind of what I want my own improv quilting to become.
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This way up! The finished top.
Improv Quilting with Strings
Exploring strings is up next in the book and I’m excited by the opportunities this technique might give me. I’ve been sorting through my fabrics and I’ve noticed I don’t have many strips that go the full width of fabric, which is what Sherri Lynn Wood suggests. It strikes me I’m at a fork in the road: I could follow the score, which would mean buying fabric (and I have an edict that says I can’t!), or could develop the score my own way and improvise with what I have. I always did like unmarked paths best, how about you?
Linking up with My Quilt Infatuation and Finish it up Friday – the first in quite a while! Have you seen Amanda Jean’s hand pieced and quilted stars quilt? Makes me feel guilty about my own Grandma’s Flower Garden quilt top, sitting patiently on the arm of my bedroom chair waiting for some borders and quilting…
Happy improvising!
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
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