Monday, January 26, 2015

Crosshairs Quilt

When I found this ribbon at Tai Pan I was thrilled!
It sat on my craft table for a day before I thought,
"Hey, that ribbon is fabric and I could use it in a quilt."
I got started cutting off the wire edges and attempted
a slice & insert technique on a few blocks and pieced 
them together and I came up with the quilt top 
that is below. (I started on this project in March 2014)

As I was piecing the 
5 blocks together with the
mustard colored fabric I decided
that I needed another fabric to use for 
sashing.I really wanted to stay in the same color
scheme so I used the back side of the mustard 
fabric for the lighter colored sashing.
I decided to treat the burlap sashing the same
way and use the back side of it in the sashing too.



Here is the completed quilt. I decided to call it Crosshairs first of all 
because burlap is full of fibers that cross each other. Secondly I 
gave it that name because of the quilting motifs criss-cross all over
the surface of the quilt.

Since I was already using the back side
of the fabric and burlap I wanted to do something else unique for the 
binding. I decided to use a faced binding, that is invisible from the 
front, but I shredded some of the burlap and put it on the left side.
There aren't any tutorials on line for how to shred burlap ribbon and
attach them to a faced binding. I was on my own for that one. 
(Quilting was completed in September 2014, just in time to enter
it into the Road to California show, only to get the reject reply from
them a few months later.)


Here are some close ups of the quilt.
This quilt is probably the 3rd quilt I actually
quilted myself. After taking a Free Motion 
Quilting class and attending Road to California
this year I am working on my quilting skills and
I also have a better idea of what quilting looks
like on a quilt accepted into the show.





Now my question is, "Do you quilt what you 
like and know? Or do you quilt what the 
judges want and expect?" I think all artists 
struggle with being true to what they know
how to do, and wanting to meet the expectations 
of what a client expects, (in this case...a judge).
I think that both can work together, but it's 
through time and experience that we gain 
the knowledge that we need. 

I noticed at Road to California there were lots
of quilts with every square inch of fabric filled 
with quilting motifs. Is this what the judges 
look for in a good quilt? Or is this what separates
show quilts from the others? 

One thing I have learned as a graphic designer
is that all good design needs to support and
communicate the message of the artist.


1 comment:

  1. I love this little quilt, and you know I was totally blown away by it when I first saw it. Good title, use of materials and of course--that design is brilliant!

    Now to your second question, one that has been posed by others (and myself) but always bears thinking about: who do we make our quilts for? If it is for ourselves, and not the judges, then you have to have perfect photos and perfect piecing and perfect quilting and lots of all of the above two. If it is for yourself, then do what you want, and maybe a judge will see your quilt and like it enough themselves to put it in a show. Some quilts are trendy (sparkles!) and overly quilted (we both saw those), and I know I'll never produce a show quilt, but then again. . . I'm not trying to.

    Do what you love, that's what I say.

    Elizabeth

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