Plaids at Play

On Friday, I did a quick post, mostly just photos.........today I will explain. What I was showing is some of the steps on the way to my entry for this year's "Wee"Quilt Challenge held annually at McDougall Cottage in Cambridge, Ontario.
The theme was "Plaids at Play"and participants were given a 4" swatch of this Olympic tartan....what would you do with that?

For this theme, I had the desire to make a quilt that could be played with. So I began with the steps you saw in the last posting, I inked and painted some heavy stabilizer, did lots of quilting, made a few cut outs, and added beading to that top layer. For the under layer I drafted a sort of Dresden plate type block.....put it together with some piecing along with both machine and hand applique. The plaid tartan was carefully cut and used in such a way that they would become the focal point of the piece. Once I had finished quilting and binding that bottom layer, I attached the "wheel".........(figuring out how to make it secure but still rotate freely was the trickiest part)

I titled it Kaleidoscope........Pattern, shape and colour appear to change with a simple turn of the wheel.

Yes! That upper layer (yellow wheel) can be turned and in doing so, the plaids play Hide and Seek!

here are some close ups so you can get an idea of the way the piece appears to change as the upper layer is rotated.

Yesterday, a friend emailed me these photos.....(Thanks Julia!!!)  uhmmm,  I was unable to attend the awards presentation last week and was not aware the piece had won a ribbon....what a terrific surprise :-) or perhaps Julia has a wicked sense of humour and is having me on LOL

I made a stand for the piece so that viewers could actually turn the wheel. Thought it might be a little difficult to play with, if it was hanging on the wall

 

 

 

 

 

 Julia also set me this wonderful shot of the old stone cottage where the show is on display until Labour Day