Progress

At the beginning of September, I showed a small whole cloth quilt top I was marking. It is a redesign of a previous piece. This one ( design called "Echo" ) is being done as a small white on white test/sample. This sort of stitching tends to be difficult to photograph, but these images might give you an idea of how it is progressing.

I am currently still in design mode and have created (on paper) several new designs which I am working to refine.....The one shown below is called "Grace"

finding myself in need of a portable project, I thought "Grace" would lend itself nicely to hand quilting.

Small Whole Cloth underway

I have decided to play with the design I recently re-vamped, the plan is to use it in a simple "white on white" wholecloth piece.
This will also give me an excuse to re-visit the use of those FriXion pens. I do like the way they glide so easily across the fabric and the fine lines they make, I worry about the lines reappearing at a later time. BUT, since this is not going to be a competition piece or a gift, it is an opportunity to "test" this out again.
I enlarged my design and have begun the process of tracing it onto white cotton.

Did you know that when you are tracing, you will find it MUCH easier and accurate if you use a broken, dotted or dashed line?

Design Mode

I seem to be in "design mode" as of late. My needle has been idle but my pencil has been busy. A while back, I showed this quilt that I designed, painted and stitched.

Every time I walk by it, I see some things I would have liked to have done differently...........so I decided to do a little "re-designing". The changes are subtle but I like this version much better.
I've named it "Echo"

Colour Pencil on Fabric

Earlier, I showed how I had begun colouring in my design which I transferred to fabric. Here is the result.

To achieve that blended multicoured look, I used 3 pencils. Working in small sections I added a bit of the blue

then some green

followed by the yellow. 

Once all 3 colours were applied, I simply continued to build the layers until the desired intensity was achieved.  As the sections were completed, I lightly brushed textile medium over the pencil to seal the colour. I tried a few different brands and found that for this project, the one I liked best was  Folk Art Textile Medium made by Plaid.

Even though this is not the sort of technique that would be used for a project that would be washed regularly, I was curious to see if it could hold up to a gentle wash. On a scrap of the same fabric, I drew and coloured with the same supplies. I cut the pieces in half, marked "wash" on the bits that would be tested.  Submerged into cool, soapy water, agitated a bit, a short soak, then rinsed.

 I placed the bits side by side once dry and as you can see, the colour remained vibrant.

Building on an idea

What began during a doodle session, grew into a design with potential for use in a variety of ways. I have decided to "test" it out in the form of  a mini whole cloth.
Since I really had only drawn 1/4 of the overall design, I first needed to make copies, which were also enlarged, then trimmed and taped together to form the complete design.

roughly 20" square

Next, it was traced onto a piece of pre-washed, 100% cotton

I am keeping the process super simple, plain old colour pencil is what I am using to bring the design lines to life. In order to mitigate the possibility of smudging the tracing, I am keeping most of the traced fabric folded up as I work and only exposing as much area as needed at a time.

Randomly laying in the colour using 1 pencil each, in Blue, Green and Yellow, then blending. The colour will later be sealed with a textile medium  ( I plan to do a couple of "tests" to see which brand I like best for this project)

 I will go into more details of this process as it progresses.

Revisions

Still playing with the moth design, feeling that it was too "busy", a few changes have been made. I am liking this one much better. It now has more places for the eye to rest, as well as nice open spaces that would allow for some fun quilting

Inspiration

"Inspiration" just happens. My most recent post showed a lovely piece of vintage linen that inspired me to pick up a pencil and begin a new design.  As the week progressed, I drew, doodled, erased & drew some more, here is a look at the resulting design

In addition to drawing, I did mange to get to the machine as well. I created this greeting card using a small piece of the fabric I sunprinted this summer

Vintage Linen

When I spotted this piece of vintage linen at a yard sale yesterday, I just HAD to have it! (the moth is large.....it's wing span is 19.5 inches)

perhaps this was a dresser scarf?

Upon seeing it, I was immediately reminded of this doodle I drew a few years ago

After making my purchase, I sat in the car, grabbed my tools and the early beginnings of a whole cloth design started to emerge......here is the rough idea, it will be revised many times before I am through

Don't exactly know where this will lead, but I am inspired to play!

Whole Cloth Quilt

A few months ago, I showed this quilt as I was in the process of designing and creating it. Below is the finished, painted, whole cloth piece.

you can revisit that post to see how it evolved here

Whole Cloth Evolution

Whenever I have a chance, I love to create designs. I have a number of them that I would like to turn into whole cloth pieces.
Here is a peek into the process of one I am currently working on.

Mirrors placed on 1/8th of the design shows how it might look

The design enlarged and transferred onto fabric

Then, I began filling in areas using fabric paint

Getting close

Once the painting is done, it all needs to be heat set

I really need to carve out some time to dedicate to the quilting, I have not yet decided what I will stitch in the negative space.....but I do plan to have fun!

My latest article

As the Artist in Residence for the Canadian Quilters' Association, I design and write articles for The Canadian Quilter. The Winter 2012 issue is out and contains my latest article. This time, I choose to talk about designing and provided an exercise in creating your own designs.
I had to include a shot of the cover. That quilt that appears on the cover, was created by 4 very talented ladies as a group project. It is an absolutely amazing piece.

Below, is the quilt I made for this issue, it is a small whole cloth piece 30" square. I showed how to mark (or not mark rather) those circles. here .......and ..... how I basted it, here

I LOVE a Challenge

Like most guilds, each year we are given a new challenge. Those who chose to participate were given some fabric and a just a few rules. Our guild is celebrating 30 years so our challenge was to work with the fabric given ( our guild colours Blue and Gold) along with any other fabric of our choosing. The rules were pretty simple. The challenge fabric HAD to be visible on the front of the piece and it also needed to have at least 1 dimension measuring 30 inches.
The fact that blue and gold is likely one of my least favourite colour combos made this even more of a challenge for me.
I generally use challenges as an opportunity to try something that I have not yet done. I used this as an opportunity to do a small whole cloth type quilt with a "faux"trapunto effect. It is titled Challenging the Rules, the 30" dimension is from corner to corner on the diagonal.
I started by creating a fairly simple design with our guild logo/block at the center. These bits were cut from the challenge fabric and fused to a plain piece of muslin.Next, I overlaid a piece of tone on tone white fabric on top, which as you can see quiets down those colours very effectively.
I used 2 layers of batting to create more drama to the areas that would not be stitched.
I began by stitching just around the motifs.Then it was a simple matter of experimenting with a variety of free motion quilt designs, again, I wanted to try some things I had not done before, such as the crosshatching and circles.
I learned a great deal working on this little quilt and really want to tackle something similar on a much larger scale. I learned that eyeballing straight lines is not a very good idea, I learned I could FMQ crosshatch using a ruler, I learned circles can have the illusion of round without being perfectly round and I also learned that it is rather difficult to properly photograph a white quilt.....I apologize for these photos (they are not the best)
I wondered if I would be disqualified because of my interpretation of the challenge fabrics being "visible" on the front. But apparently the voting members thought it was okay as this piece placed third among some really fabulous work. I am ALWAYS amazed at the wonderful, unique variety of work each challenge brings year after year.

Taking shape

In my last post, I told you that I had a plan to use the Celtic knot that I had drawn as part of the Creative Prompt Project..............but I did not say exactly what I planned. I have mentioned that I am intrigued with whole cloth quilting and want to try my hand at designing one. While I know that there are lots of beautiful designs available out there, I prefer to keep my work as original as possible.
Since I have never done this sort of thing before, I thought perhaps I should start small. So here is my knot, now surrounded by the designs I came up with. This will be a miniature, as the piece you see here is a mere 18" from edge to edge. You'll also notice that those lines are fairly dark,...........well, that is because I have no intention of removing them......... it's just something else I want to try and to find out what that might, be you'll need to check back later.


and here is my most recent doodle for the CPP. #43, which is Gratitude.