Textile Art (Quilts)

Not your Grandmother’s quilts!

During the pandemic shutdown I started climbing the walls. Half of what I knew about getting anything done was now suddenly shut off to me! Myself and the rest of the world too; I understand. Since I have to create or go insane, and like to sew (but have more than enough of a wardrobe,) I turned back to something I haven’t done since I was 12. That is, start quilting again.

Below are featured some of the quilts that I have created. They are listed in descending order, with the most recent at the top and the oldest at the bottom. A person’s style and technique often changes and improves the more they engage in something, so I feel it’s a fair representation.

Many thanks to my husband for taking these pictures. He normally takes pictures of flowers and landscapes. Retouching these (we both were involved in that,) to make them look like they do in real life is a whole different game, and it makes me really appreciate the work that professionals do. You’ll see some photos below that I’m not too proud of, but we did our best.

This quilt I named “Moonglow Through Stained Glass”. The construction technique of the ombre blocks is a variation on the Log Cabin construction method (there’s a whole family of variations on that.) The ‘Stained Glass’ blocks are all Foundation Paper Pieced. It’s also based on a Jinny Beyer quilt pattern entitled “Moonglow”. I decided I wanted something just a little bit different, so instead of placing alternate squares of different types of Star patterns I chose to do Paper-Pieced ‘Stained Glass’ blocks.

No, your eyes are not fooling you. Every black ‘line’ in the stained glass panels is exactly 3/16 of an inch wide. I was able to do a very precision job on this quilt. This is a good illustration of how practice and experience pay off.

I had never done Paper Piecing before. It’s actually quite time consuming. It also is not an efficient use of fabric – though the end result is well worth it. Each of the blocks you see here that have that ‘stained glass’ effect took me an average of 3 1/2 hours to create. Several took longer than that. Since I’ve been tracking my time now, I can tell you that it took me 120 hours to make the main quilt itself, and a total of 135 to create the 3 accent pillows and the body pillow that goes with. Since I created the stained glass blocks for the pillows at the same time as I was creating all the blocks for the main body of the quilt, simply an extra 15 hours isn’t quite accurate. All total more time than that went into the pillows, but overall the whole thing took me 135 hours.

Normally I would break down photographing details on the quilt, but I’ve been trying to get this page up for a couple months now. For now, here’s a picture. Hopefully I’ll come back and put in some detailed shots later. I just really needed to get this page ready for publishing…

(That’s my husband standing behind the body pillow, holding it up. =)

The name of this quilt is, “For Maria and Modernism.” Constructed entirely via the Dresden Plate and Applique construction techniques; in 2023 I noticed that the designs of Maria Martinez of San Ildefonz Pueblo lent themselves very well to blending with Art Deco. Since I like to incorporate Art Deco into my quilt designs I decided to create this.

I’ve started tracking exactly how long it takes me to create these, and this one took 70 hours of work, plus one hour for the label stitched to a back corner (not pictured.) Normally it takes me longer. This is just a little bit smaller than I usually make. Mind you, everything is totally from scratch. No pattern! I started out with black fabric, white fabric, various notions and the right tools. (I don’t like to cut corners on doing the job right.)

Among the tools that help create what I did here specifically is a set of Bias Tape Making tools. I know how to create bias tape without having a specific tool to do so, but having a set of Bias Tape Makers made the job much easier and was well worth the agravation it saved me. It also allows for such a level of precision that I don’t think this would have turned out looking as nice if I had not used them.

A neighbor looked at this and said it looked like something that should be hanging in the lobby of a certain high-end Flagstaff hotel he was thinking of. I hadn’t thought of that. I just get going and create these things, but then I looked at it hanging up and thought, “Gee, he’s got a point.”

The image isn’t cropped because I’m relying on the background to give you a sense of scale. Pardon the clutter!

These images show some of the detailing touches on this quilt. If you need to see it larger, right click on the image and select ‘open image in new tab’. It can then also be enlarged further if you need in any image processing application of your choice. From the left, details of the faux rabbit fur in the very center of the quilt, turquoise stones at the tips of the center feathers and a few other spots, and white howlite stones at the cardinal compass points of the center design. The latter two are affixed with fabric glue that I’ve used before, so I know those stones are NOT going anywhere.

…And it’s still not perfect… I swear that quilters are their own harshest crititcs. Still, not bad for having eye-balled the placement of everything along with a tape measure and a straight edge.

“One All-Purpose Generic French Braid Quilt in Tones of Blue, Green and Yellow” No pattern needed to create something like this. Just know the technique. As an aside, my husband sometimes tells me that I make my quilts too big. He’s got a point, but I never set out with a set, final size. I just go where the design leads.

The following images are close-ups that show details of the top-stitching and quilting patterns.

Fair warning: I’m really not proud of the following photo. It just didn’t come out right, but we did our best. The main take-away from it should be the quilting/sewing pattern that it shows. It was taken from the back of the quilt because the pattern of light through the pin-holes made it easier to make out over the sections that involved fabric that had color. If it involves layers of black fabric both front and back, then “No can do,” for showing it that way.

I definitely had to poke around for awhile before I figured out that I prefer straight-line quilting patterns over anything wavy or with curves. I have nothing against the latter. I just finally figured out that not only do I like those kind of patterns much better, but they are also much easier to do! It definitely takes practice to move fair-sized sections of sandwiched fabric around underneath a moving sewing needle, and make anything with either a curve or freeform look good. My respect to those that are able to do that well.

This one I call “Burano II”. The technique is all Log Cabin construction. It’s based on a Jinny Beyer table runner pattern called ‘Burano’. I simply looked at it and thought, “That’s gorgeous! – but it’s just a table runner. I want to do something bigger.” Hmmm… So I picked apart the pattern, extrapolating from it, and wound up with this gorgeous piece. =)

This is actually the second time I’ve made this quilt pattern. The first time I did it, I cut corners – massively. (The first attempt at this was my second quilt. I had to be on quilt #4 before I felt like my stitching and quality control were finally becoming acceptable.) The first time, I did not trim the blocks as I went along! This resulted in something that looked very mis-matched. Part of the learning curve, I guess. Doing it a second time – and doing it while holding myself to stricter standards – a secondary pattern of illusionary squares emerged, rotated 90 degrees from the initial design. I hadn’t even thought of that in the design before. I guess it just goes to show that when you do the job right some wonderful things can emerge.

I also stitched the top cover of this quilt by hand – completely. My machine was in the shop at the time. It also became my exercise in holding myself to more exacting standards. Once the top was completed I then realized that I hadn’t done any of the Quilt-As-You-Go quilting that I normally do! I had two choices: Take the top cover apart, or take it to a Long-arm Quilter. I chose the latter. I felt that I’d fussed with it enough and could treat myself this time. She did a wonderful job. She was bit back-logged for awhile, but when I got it back I couldn’t have been happier. I then proceeded to stitch the border fabric around the edges on top, stitch a quilt label on the back, and all was good.

This quilt is up there as possibly the largest one I’ve ever made. What can I say? The design got away from me. Usually I let the design tell me how big the quilt should be. This one definitely got bigger than I was planning. The irony? I deliberately cut the fabric strips narrower than usual because I knew the widths tend to add up. Yet here we are…

“Prism” (pattern sold by) Shabby Fabrics. Made from a quilt kit by the same. There’s not much to say about this one aside from, “I like it!” =) Predominantly I was experimenting with the ‘Pineapple’ construction technique. No real attention to detailed top stitching for this one. I will say that in real life the quilt is very even around the edges and border. Again, there seems to be a glitch when one actually hangs a quilt up and expects it to look as even as it does in real life. I KNOW I didn’t mess THAT up. (???)

Bear in mind that there are over 37 different patterns of fabric in ‘Prism’.

“Cocktail Hour” is the name of the pattern, (not my own creation.) Selection of the materials and stitching style was. This was the first quilt (fourth in order of creation) that I made where I really started to feel that my stitchwork was OK after all. Anyone who quilts knows that those who do are their own worst critics, though I will point out that the upper left-hand corner of this quilt is just fine in real life. For some reason it ended up folded in just a bit in this photo and I didn’t want to Photoshop it out for fear of distorting anything. My bad – or lack of professional skill. Take your pick. It’s also the first quilt where I realized that not only do I prefer straight-line quilting, but I have a preference for Art Deco styles.

The modern quilting standard when it comes to determining how close stitches should be in the actual ‘quilting’ phase varies depending on whom you talk to. A manufacturer might say that top-stitching can be as much as 8-10″ apart. Those who actually do the quilting tend to say anywhere from 2 1/2″ – 1 1/2″ depending on the situation. (Even that advice will vary.) I prefer to stitch much closer. I say this also because it was with this quilt, once I discovered my preferred style, that I really started to enjoy getting into stitching patterns into my quilts – without interfering with the pattern created by the fabric. (Enjoy on multiple levels! =) This quilt will always remain one of my favorites for the way it turned out.

Here are some details of the top-stitching. Brightness and Contrast have been tweaked a bit in Photoshop to attempt to bring out the details:

Four of my quilts are not pictured:

One of them is the first one (since age 12,) that I created back in 2020. I really don’t think I did a good job. It was a steep curve to get back all the little touches and considerations to do a truly good job, and I had to change the final composition because there were some things that I ignored. As a result, I couldn’t create the design I set out to do. It’s certainly useable and came out OK, but I know where I made mistakes.

The next one? It taught me that details are important. The closer to the beginning you make a mistake and don’t bother to correct it? The more it will show. Do not think, “Oh, it will be OK.” It won’t. I am absolutely not proud of how that one turned out. A friend of mine insisted to me up and down that he wanted it anyway, so I went ahead and gave it to him after replicating the pattern all over again from scratch. Bless him; he is so happy to have that quilt. (Thank you, Frank.) It makes me feel a little bit better that someone wanted that one after all.

The one after that? That was a lesson in not cutting corners; to just break down and get the right tool. I didn’t, thinking I could wing it a different way, and as a result the pieces would not come together the way they were supposed to, leading to having to alter the final design to one I really wasn’t happy with. Lesson learned there!

The fourth one not pictured? Its actually number 5 or 6 in order of creation and is unfinished, but it’s one where I really started to explore decorative, free-hand top-stitching. I had so many problems with mis-matched thread types, breakage, didn’t know about adjusting the depth of the quilting foot at that point… It just started looking really ugly, so I learned from the experience in addition to deciding not to finish it.

I hope you enjoyed looking these quilts over. May your day be a little bit brighter for looking at some creative designs that are also wonderfully functional. There is just nothing like the weighted feel of sleeping underneath a home-made quilt. In fact, go ahead and sleep underneath two. =)

Sandra