My odd design process

For me making a quilt is all about having a good time while I do it.  My approach maximizes the parts I like to do and minimizes or eliminates entirely the parts I don't like to do.  I don't like to have a complete plan to execute.  Instead I like to have a general idea and improvise as I go along.  Luckily precision is not my priority and I like things better when they are a little out of whack.  I do some thinking and dreaming and scheming about size and construction process.   I like a quilt that looks good from a distance but also has details that you can only appreciate close up.  I don't like to do much precision cutting and I don't like precision piecing.  I love color and playing with color.

I am usually inspired by my materials and a desire to enhance them rather than a plan to bend them to a design in my head.  This quilt is inspired by my love of Vicki Welsh hand dyed fabrics and by Wanda Hanson's Neapolitan quilt.  I love the work of both women and I know they are friends.  In my mind, this quilt celebrates that.

Vicki's colors are so beautiful with lots of subtle changes.   I like them so much that I've been intimidated by them, afraid I would destroy their beauty.   I've had some of her fabrics for years and could not bear to use them except in small strips.  But finally I have an idea that I like enough to cut them up (gulp).

Here is my simple plan.  I cut the fabrics into squares.  Then I find a batik fabric that enhances the hand dyed fabric.  I cut the strip and applique it to the square background.  My applique method is very simple, I just use a zigzag stitch. 

From a distance the quilt is all these beautiful glowing colors.

 From close up you can see the designs in the batiks and the subtle beauty of the background.

Right now I am working on choosing and applying the strips, which is very fun for me, because I am playing with color, which is my favorite part.  And I will get play with  color again when I decide how they best fit together. 

Mostly I don't care if anyone else likes what I do.  But this time I hope Wanda and Vicki will like how I am using the fabrics.  In any case, a big thank you to both of them for the beauty of what they do and the pleasure they provide me.

Woven Strips Quilt Design

I am playing with 2.5 inch strips.  You can buy pre-cut strips in nice color combinations.  I am going to start with those and probably supplement from my fabric stash.  This is a simple design because it uses all the same size pieces and they are cut from strips.  This design will allow me to play with the colors as I go along, and that is one of my favorite things.

I used Excel for this design.  I used borders, format copy/paste, and fill colors to make my design.   Oh, yes and I used a macro to make the cells square.

 The "blocks" are not square blocks but why do they have to be? 

The design is just the idea to get started.  The quilt I make will not be colored like this.  It will have more variation and probably very different colors.  Who knows what else will be different... I often change things as I go along.  I don't like being locked into a plan.

I am still thinking about construction.  I may highlight the texture by using an extra layer of batting in the vertical strips.  I think I will sew the five strips parts together right sides together in the convential manner.  I may use the zig zag stitch on the vertical ones.  Then I can quilt that extra batting layer at the same tie I piece those together.

Here are my notes on fabric requirements and cutting the pieces.

Use 2.5 inch strips

finished blocks are 16 wide by 10 high

40 blocks total (5 blocks wide by 8 blocks high)

quilt is 80 inches square

320 strips total (8 strips per block, x 40 blocks)

all strips are cut 10.5 long (or cut full width strips in quarters)

80 fabric strips (320 block size strips/ 4 strips per fabric width)

To use two colorways as pictured:

120 vertical  weave colorway block strips (3 strips per block time 40 blocks)

30 vertical weave fabric strips (120 divided by 4 per strip)

200 horizontal weave colorway blocks strips (5 strips per block times 40 blocks)

50 horizontals weave fabric strips (200 divided by 4 strips per block)

Tile design tool

Daltile has this pretty cool little tile design tool.  It's fun and you can actually order your design.  You select your canvas, pattern, and tiles.  Then you can get a quote on your tile.

Here is a floor designed for a 1950's retro bathroom.

Source

I used the tool to make a much simpler design for my small shower floor.

The tiles I chose are 1" square and speckled light and dark grays.  I think they will be nice in that very small space.

Desert Gray Speckle D200

Suede Gray Speckle D208

   

        And here is another color combination (same background, green accent).

Excel as a design tool

I don't own any fancy graphics design tools.  I've tried a few and they always seem hard to learn and have many more features than I need.  I am pretty happy with what I can do with Excel, MS Photo Editor and Picasa.  I start with Excel using just borders, drawing tools and colors and a macro that makes square cells.

You can change the Excel color palette, which is key.  Here is a simple quilt design I did in Excel and then pasted into MS Photo Editor so it is a .jpg file.  It shows the colors, design and fabric requirements.  I like the colors a lot but am having some trouble finding the right fabrics.

Sometimes I lay out a single block and take a photo of the block. It looks like this after it has been cropped:

Then I open several copies in MS Photo Editor and put them together.  I can also rotate the blocks (the second row is made of rotated blocks):

I can get a pretty good idea of what the whole quilt will look like by putting lots of blocks together.

I also sometimes download fabric photos from on-line quilt shops/fabric manufacturers to use in this process.  That helps me decide if I want to buy a fabric for my quilt.  This doesn't work perfectly since the photos sometimes are not accurate representations of the colors, but it's still pretty helpful.

I use Excel for lots of design problems.  I designed our kitchen cabinets with Excel.  You can look at that here.