I taught a class in Shenandoah, Iowa earlier this year, and my hostess treated me to the progress on her guild challenge quilt. It’s remarkable so I wanted to share it with you. She started by drawing these four fabrics randomly, and at first glance, you might think that was disheartening.
Carolyn began with these four seemingly unrelated fabrics.
But Carolyn is nothing if not an adventurer, and she soon found the common element. What do you think it was?
My friends, the commonality among the fabrics was orange.
And with that, Carolyn went to town.
She made a medallion for the quilt’s center, repeating the fabrics several times to create cohesion.
She made Pinwheels and framed them with triangle-squares.
She added a little of this and a little of that, continuing to repeat the oranges and adding in some deep chocolate brown.
Can you imagine how exciting it was to sew this? It’s the kind of quilt where you make decisions as you go. You don’t worry about the end result while you’re doing it. You just make one decision at a time. The quilt pulls you along.
This is how the quilt looked when I visited, but she wasn’t finished yet.
The photo below arrived recently. The quilt grew and grew! She added half-square triangles, hourglass units, stars and more. They were repeated so as to bring more unity to the composition. The narrow borders that repeat three times also help to pull everything together. It’s astounding.
I so enjoyed hearing about Carolyn’s process and seeing how this quilt developed. I love it. I don’t know if I could have made those four fabrics work this well!
Takeaways for Quilters:
• Something has to tie a scrap quilt together. In this case, it was a variety of orange fabrics.
• Make decisions as you go. No need to visualize the end result. Be along for the ride!
• Stand back to audition fabrics—way back, across the room, with the fabrics on a vertical surface.
• Be brave. It’s only fabric.
Thanks for all the inspiration, Carolyn! Your quilt is wonderful!
Leave A Comment