IQF 2014 Post 7: Modern Quilts

These are about a third of the quilts that were in the Modern Quilt Guild's exhibition at Festival 2014. They are the ones, like all the quilts in this series, that really caught my eye. For whatever reason. I kept the MQG exhibit quilts to last because I knew QuiltCon would be following soon after and I thought it might be a nice lede (not 100% sure I'm using that word right). There are a lot of pictures this week, and some detail shots of a good few quilts so I will try and keep the writing short and sweet!

Amazonia by Nathalie Bearden

Amazonia by Nathalie Bearden, a minimalist take on the mystical jungle of her childhood dreams. There is different quilting styles in each of the layers. The quilt was machine pieced and free motion quilted. It reminded me of those block diagrams you learn to draw in geography class, I loved those.

Detail of Amazonia by Nathalie Bearden

Anni Albers' Orange Chair by Martha Peterson

Anni Albers' Orange Chair by Martha Peterson was made for the Seattle Modern Quilt Guild's Binary Challenge, a two colour quilting test. An email ad for Anni Albers' designs sparked some exploration and inspiration from Triangulated Intaglio IV. The lone orange chair made its own way in to this red and white quilt using HSTs in a 'non-traditional setting with irregular negative space'.

City Center by Angie Henderson

City Center by Angie Henderson is a medallion quilt, although the design is Modern Log Cabin by Art Gallery Fabric Staff in Generation Q. Magazine Jan-Feb 2014 edition. The tiny little borders make me the happiest, and then the inserts of perpendicular rectangles and squares within some borders come a close second!

Disruption by Barbara Lockwood

Disruption by Barbara Lockwood is here to play with your mind. Seriously, how did she put this together and not go barmy? It's more than a little bit brilliant. My photo has not done justice to the colours. The inspiration was a traditional Chinese porcelain design, and from Barbara's fascination with tessellations and Escher. To disrupt the orderliness of the pattern and create energy Barbara changed the colours and allowed her quilting to flow from that.

Entropy by Elisa Albury

Entropy by Elisa Albury was conceived from the shapes and negative spaces created by dropping a container of ice-cream sprinkles. And from a distance it did indeed make me think of hundreds and thousands! (Is that an Irish term for sprinkles?) This quilt is fun.

Detail of Entropy by Elisa Albury

Funky Junk by Renee Tallman

Funky Junk by Renee Tallman is just great. It's made of drunkard's path blocks and a quilt top that was sewn together and cut apart 7 times. It got thrown in the bin twice out of frustration. But finally, Renee made this beauty inspired by another quilt she saw once 20 years ago. Renee thinks Funky Junk is now acceptable and she quite likes it. There is some beautiful handstitching too! That is some mad-ass tenacity right there, and that's what makes this quilt my favourite.

Detail of Funky Junk by Renee Tallman

Grand Canal by Casey York, quilted by Ann McNew

Grand Canal by Casey York and quilted by Ann McNew is kind of bland I think, not the quilting - that's spectacular, but the perspective use crossed with the total minimalism is new for me so I'm including it here. The perspective play is based on work of garden designers of the 17th century and this vista is from the gardens of Versailles designed by Andre le Notre. In the 17th century apparently they were all into having it look as if their landscaping extended into almost infinity. Casey has a book on using applique to create illusions of depth if you're interested, more details at the link on her name above.

Detail of Grand Canal by Casey York, quilting by Ann McNew

Homage by Jacquie Gering

Homage by Jacquie Gering is based on the colour principles of Josef Albers (nice to have him now and Anni above!). This quilt illustrates the principles of making one colour appear as two. Jacquie has used Albers' book Interaction of Color as a touchstone while she's grown as an artist so this quilt is aptly named. I enjoyed spending time at this quilt and following the different colours around and watching how my perception of them changed. Maybe more fun to do than describe...?

Only three more quilts lads, we can do it!

Off Center by Charlotte Noll

Off Center by Charlotte Noll was an entry into the MQG's Riley Blake Challenge. The front is appliquéd and I love the spiral in the centre of the crazy whirlpool of colour lightning that's happening here. It's like something that pops out of a cartoon characters head after they've been biffed with a mallet.

The White Rainbow by Shruti Dandekar

The White Rainbow by Shruti Dandekar was a quilt I was really looking forward to seeing in person and it didn't disappoint. I love the idea of writing the rainbow in braille on white fabric and then quilting it trapunto style (never quite sure how to use trapunto in a sentence). Shruti also added some coloured quilting lines among her matchstick quilting so when you get up close and personal with the quilt there is a rainbow hiding there, as well as the slightly larger one in the binding.

Detail of The White Rainbow by
Shruti Dandekar

Tune in Next Week by Chawne Kimber, quilted by Pamela Cole

Finally, we have Tune in Next Week by Chawne Kimber, quilted by Pamela Cole. Another MQG fabric challenge, this time from Michael Miller. The fabric reminded Chawne of Sputnik and early TV antennae and so a mid-century mod design was born. Improv log cabins of irregular sizes 'bounce' around the quilt top and elsewhere 'playful deconstructions of architecture' take place. I'm not a fan of mid-century mod design but in this quilt I clearly see the playful television vibe and I really like the changes in line thickness throughout, just like above. It draws me in and makes me want to stay.

That's it, we're done. I've really enjoyed doing this even if it might have been overwhelming to read? Those of us who aren't going to QuiltCon get to wait for the photos of the quilts that are hanging there to start showing up next weekend. I'm interested to see all the directions people have been heading in, though I guess I have to remember it is a curated exhibition of those directions.

My Personal FMQ Challenge

The best way over a fear in sewing is just to jump in, I've spent the months eyeballing a new technique in outright fear, panic, and awe. Considering it, looking at others work, deciding mine is never, ever going to match up regardless of practice, and shuffling away to leave it for a few more months before beginning the eyeballing over again. But each time once I've jumped I've loved it, I've made mistakes, I've cursed, and ripped seams, but I've felt invigorated and alive, and like I could conquer anything just because I tried.

Free motion quilting is probably my longest running sewing longing/fear. So I've challenged myself this year to do weekly practice, and to just free motion quilt some stuff. The weekly practice is going to add up to a QAYG quilt, another technique that's long had me baffled, and again the only to really understand it is to go through it. So I bought a layer cake of Botanics and of Silent Film by Kona, and each week I will quilt a 10" square with whatever design I fancy.

I first tried to start this challenge last September, but I only got one square in before it fell by the wayside overtaken by things I felt I should be doing, wasn't doing, and therefore became even more urgent to get done. I'm not sure this is the best way to improve. It's possible that taking one design and practicing it over and over would make me really great at that one design, but I'm hoping that this will teach me to loosen up and get into the sort of flow of the quilting.

FMQ seems to require a sweet spot between not thinking too much and not thinking too little, kind of like playing music. Also, the instant you think, 'hey, I'm doing great right now' is the instant you lose it and it all goes to shit. For some unaccountable reason my cheap, basic machine has taken to FMQ like a duck to water with minimal to no tension issues (I am touching wood as I type this).

The biggest problem is that I have no way to regulate my stitches apart from, you know, me! Some days I do great, some days I do terrible, I'm heavy footed and slow handed and there's billions of tiny stitches. I've also discovered there's no point in me marking the design because the foot will block at least half of it and I'll mess up while peering to see where I'm supposed to go next. My concentration is poor, which means the design often starts great but ends up getting woollier and woollier.

It is lovely though, I get sort of lost in it and then the reward is the lovely texture at the end that you get to stroke. I think I'll probably revisit some of these designs again. I really like the spiral squares in the yellow and the echoing leaves (though they kind of look like flames, and that's what I was chanting while I stitched it). I'm going to stop now, because I'm starting to sound quite mad.

I'll be linking up with WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced!

IQF 2014 Post 4: Farm to Fabric

The Celebrating Farm to Fabric Exhibit was the product of a challenge set by the American Made Brand. The quilts are made from American Made Brand's cotton solids and the quilters were asked, "What does it mean to you, your family or your community to bring fabric production back to America to use in American made quilts?".

In a serendipitous twist of fate my delay in doing this series till 2015 means I can link to the next quilter's post about this piece which went up this very week! I had seen sneak peeks of this one on instagram before I went to Festival and I was really looking forward to seeing it in real life. I'm not going to be much use because this is yet more online photos of it, but the scale of this quilt is astonishing. The piecing is tiny, and not at all paper pieced.

In Hogtown by Completely Cauchy

In Hogtown by Completely Cauchy is stunning in person, here are some close ups. The quilted grid is about 1" square by my best estimate. This was early in the day, so I was a little scared to put my finger near the quilt for scale... Silly and stupid of me!

Close up of In Hogtown - love the raspberry insert in the binding!

Look at the little corner of blue there amongst the green and yellow, that makes me so happy. And knowing that this is an interpretation of a real town (Gainesville, FL), it makes me love this extra. But also seriously, 1" quilting grid - see how small it makes that piecing! Crazy crazy crazy!

Close up of In Hogtown - 1" quilting grid, tiny piecing, happy blue corner

Furrows by Charlotte Noll is made with fused raw-edged appliqué and pieced. The inspiration comes from the farm fields in her home state of Florida, where she can drive through the countryside seeing newly prepared fields ready for planting and lush orange groves. Though most of the small farms near where she lives have been bought up and covered with concrete to be turned into stores. This quilt really caught my eye, I love the expanding diagonals, and the radiating nature of the lines, the fact that they're all at different angles and in such good colours just makes me happy on the inside.

Furrows by Charlotte Noll

This next quilt is made by various artists and is made up of license plates from the 50 states. Tour License Plate Quilt employs various techniques as you might imagine, and has an entire blog tour in case you want to make your own version. Each quilter was selected to make a license plate based on the state they call home!

Tour License Plate Quilt by Various Artists

I've lived in Texas and DC, now DC isn't a state so I had to go for second best, I worked in Maryland while I lived in DC so that's the license plate I took the picture of as a close up! This quilt is a lot of fun, we spent ages looking for Virginia and I'm not sure we found it before we had to move for other people to take photos so there's lots to look at.

Check out how bad the lighting was or my photo taking...

Finally this week we have Fresh Beginnings by Monica Mondragon. This quilt caught my eye straight away. The quilt is machine pieced, appliquéd, and hand-embroidered. Monica wanted to depict the early morning starts of her agricultural background, and how beautiful the sunrise is over rows and rows of crops. She used a squared dresden plate to achieve an intentionally pop art appearance which I love! Again I'm attracted to the radiating lines in strong solid colours, I might be sensing a trend in myself.

Fresh Beginnings by Monica Mondragon

Have a good weekend everyone! Hope you fit in some time getting to do something fun :)

Eithne's Retro Flowers

Hi all! Long time no see, on here! I've been slow on the old sewing front for the last couple of months, and set myself one big finish for Christmas. I started this quilt in summer 2013 after learning to sew curves.

The fabric is all Anna Maria Horner's Field Study, in one of the colour ways. It was bought over two years ago now a brief google of my email tells me! The solids were from Simply Solids stash club that I took part in last year, and I think they just happened to be the colours that had been sent out at the time I started the quilt! I'm starting to reach now, but I think that the background is Kona Butter.

Yes, that is leopard print binding :p

The pattern is Retro Flowers by the Sometimes Crafter. I bought it as part of the Curves Class I did with Rachel over at Stitched in Color.I adapted the layout a bit, so as there is a sort of central medallion to make the best use of the fabric amounts I had to hand. I love the finished product and the shapes of those petals! However, I've discovered that I detest following quilt patterns. Clothing patterns I love, I feel like I'm learning something new with every step, same with bag patterns. But I railed against following a quilt pattern.

I guess I can't tell if this is innate to me or particular to this pattern as it's the only proper pattern I've ever followed. My guess is that it's innate to me, but also that after a good long break I'll probably attempt some other unlucky pattern just to make sure... ;)

This is the photo that shows the truest colours.

I didn't measure the finished size, but it was 61" square before I quilted, but I basted badly and had to trim after quilting. So my guess is that it's now 59"-ish square. And, OH, the quilting! I started with a double grid around the blocks which was so boring to do and I nearly gave up and unpicked it and tried to FMQ my first ever quilt. But it was less than a week to my flight home and that was too much insanity even for me. So I stuck to my original plan, but once I'd added on the planned diagonal lines they looked kind of skimpy, so I started adding more. I probably could have kept going except for deadlines and flights and the need for binding...

Hodge podge backing which I ended up loving!

This quilt is for my sister. It's always been for her, before I even started. So every pin that stuck me, every curve I sewed, then unpicked and sewed again, every instruction I followed badly, they were all done with her in mind. I'm glad I followed some random pieces of advice I got early on and cut all my blocks in one go, mammoth task that it was, but I would have given up if I had to cut in between blocks. Those curves nearly got me. But they taught me in the end, I learned that for me no pins are the curvy way to go!

Eithne loves it! Yay! So much it actually got stuffed into her tiny little suitcase and brought straight back home after Christmas - it's not every Christmas my presents can claim that joy! I managed to snap a few pictures of it in daylight the day before she left, though I was still working on the label so she'll have to brave sewing that on herself. I don't have a good or daylight picture of that yet, so next time or instagram! Promise!

Happy New Year!!!

BQF - Pigeon House

Pigeon House was inspired by a photograph I saw of dawn behind a Dublin landmark, the cooling towers at Poolbeg (locally referred to as Pigeon House). I lived in Dublin for 8 years before I moved to America and I always loved seeing the towers as part of the skyline there. If you want you can read my original post here.

Pigeon House

The MQG's Riley Blake Basics Challenge fabrics made me think of dawn/sunset colours and so I made this quilt at the start of this year, though I didn't finish on time for the challenge. I designed the top section in mostly 1" squares and HSTs, and the bottom is a self-drafted paper-pieced pattern. I took my sweet time with the quilting. I knew exactly what I wanted to achieve, but I had never deviated from quilting on either side of seams or some diagonal lines. So even though I kept to straight lines here, I changed it up in different sections to suit.

Yellow quilting around sun, black in buildings, and white on the strand!

Burying threads was definitely the most time consuming part. I'd never done it before, didn't really know how to do it, and trying to bury black threads on a black backing fabric is tedious to say the least! However, the effects are amazing and for the right project I would definitely do it again. The lovely people of instagram also informed me when I started complaining about batting fluff on my black backing that black batting exists - I have so many things left to learn in quilting!

Black Backing - thread burying headache

This quilt definitely pushed my boundaries, and even writing about it now has reminded me why I should do that more often. It was trying at times, I took a long time, but I really loved learning so much and now I get to see a little bit of home that I've made for myself every single day!

My new view!

I'm entering this into the mini quilt category at the Blogger's Quilt Festival over at Amy's Creative Side! And then I'm going to spend most of the next week looking at all the entries in all the categories, I love this festival - so much to discover!!


Quilt Stats:
Fabrics: MQG Riley Blake Basics Challenge Fabrics
Size: 20" square
Pattern by: Me
Pieced & Quilted by: Me on my domestic Brother

Rediscovering Improv

I took the 10 Ways to Love Improvisational Quilting class with Malka Dubrawsky on CreativeLive last week. It was free when it was live, though you have to buy it if you want to see the recording now - it's $79. It was the first time I've taken a class on CreativeLive. It was an experience, I decided on a whim. I had some free time, and needed something to pick up my mood and my sewing mojo.

Improv log cabins: warm, cool, & rainbow

I did find that the class was poorly explained in advance. I did know it was live, and that it would be running from 11am to 6pm my time. But I didn't realise at first that it was on for two days, thankfully I had both days to spare. They didn't provide a list of required materials ahead of time either so the first day was quite the scramble. I just pulled two black and white fabrics, a white fabric, and a collection of solids I bought over a year ago for a different project. I culled that project off my to do list at the end of the summer so they were looking for a new home :)

Pinwheels made with improv'd HSTs

Sewing along at home was ambitious, they really raced through the projects. True Malka had some pieces half prepared, and the people in the studio had baskets of materials provided, whereas I was dashing about, but Malka is a machine! I'd say I only attempted half the blocks Malka demonstrated. But it was so much fun!

Flying geese - I have a not great track record with
making these look nice, so we'll see!

I forgot, somehow, that the answer to how much I hate the cutting part of making quilts is improv quilting. It's so freeing! I had so much fun, I learned some new things, re-learned some stuff I'd done before but let flow out of my brain through lack of use. It is exhausting though, there are so many decisions to make all the way through. It's like when you go and do the groceries, and then they try and get you with sweets at the checkout because they know you're exhausted by making choices and you're weak now and will just buy random crap. After two days of improv, even with Malka leading the way for me, I was exhausted - thank god it was a Project Runway night!

I always sew these better super slowly and without pins.

I did some more sewing over the long weekend and added in some more blocks, including a giant HST star.

Really like this star that Malka suggested making with HSTs

I'm now thinking about trying to join all these up like a medallion quilt - ambitious! But I'm loving these colours and shapes so much, plus I want to see if I can do it ;)

Dodgy pic, but thinking a triangle border after this, then drunkard's paths,
then a final string/strip border.

Linking up to WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced!

Kate's Quilt: A Colourful Journey

One of my oldest friends had her very first baby this summer. I've know her well for 14 years, and of her for longer. I've known her partner for close to 12 years. I didn't stop smiling for at least a week after I heard about the baby, and knew instantly I wanted to make a quilt. I emailed and asked if there was anything they would like or definitely wouldn't like (I definitely went overboard, I made a Pinterest board especially for their baby!), and I was told something colourful and maybe an applique animal. It took me from DC to Houston via Ireland, and Christmas to Easter, to finally come up with a design and fabrics I really loved. In the end simple lines and the rainbow won out! I was majorly inspired by two quilts: Dare to be Different by grapes and hearts; and Don't Worry Be Happy by Carina E-H.

My biggest challenge was deciding on what sort of applique animal to do, I considered owls for a long time, but was won back over to elephants because of the Eames elephant that I know has lived with these two for some years now. My drawing skills are all kinds of atrocious unless it involves a ruler, or a full on doodle, so I totally cheated when it came to drawing up the elephant applique. I bought a giant kid's sketchpad and drew a grid on it, then I found an outline of an elephant on the internet that I kind of liked and placed it over a grid in Adobe Illustrator (though I could have printed it and manually drawn a grid onto it either). Then I just copied from square to square in order to scale up the drawing to the size I needed for the quilt, about 20" x 20".

I made some changes as I went, my elephant has no tail because I wanted to hem it for longevity and I'm really terrible/new at applique and sharp turns and points for a tail were right out. I also made sure his trunk was upwards cos that looked happier to me! I think I got him attached to the backing with no puckers on the first try purely through luck, the sheet I used had a little bit of stretch to it and when I was halfway through I suddenly realised that this could all be about to go to pot. But it didn't, thankfully.

I also tried pin basting for the second time ever, and it went horrifically. Mostly because of the aforementioned stretch in the backing fabric, and a little bit because I need to buy a few more basting pins. So the first few lines of quilting had to be unpicked, then everything unbasted, re-basted with trusty spray and I was on my merry way again. I quilted diagonal lines, the spacing set by the square patchwork section, in a yellow thread. And really, it was very hard to send off by the end.

Don't freak out, some pins had been removed during quilting!

But we took it on a walk early one morning beforehand and had a lot of fun taking photos with it in the Houston sun! If I could change on thing, I would make the binding satin. I searched all the local fabric shops here but I couldn't find a navy satin that was the right colour. They were all too blue, and not dark enough, and the ones that matched had glitter in. So that was just a no. Someday I'll make a baby quilt with a sating binding, and that one will be next to impossible to give away!

Quilt Stats

Size: 42" x 45"

Pattern: My own

Top: Free Spirit Designer Solids

Binding: Kona Solid

Backing: Super soft old white sheet

Batting: Warm & Natural

Linking up, for the first time in a long time, to TGIFF over at Quilt Matters today!