I have a quilt that I finished back in February that I haven't shared here on my blog yet.
I call it "My Modern Voice".
This quilt is my own original pattern and design although I took my inspiration from a quilt in Quilting Modern by Jacquie Gering and Katie Pedersen. My inspiration quilt is called Fiesta and it is on page 122 of the book. It is a square quilt with an orange square border on the outside, red square border in the middle and purple square border on the inside. Then inside of the purple, is a patchwork square of print fabrics. My inspiration was the patchwork and the use of solid colors.
I love patchwork and I think it connects me to traditional quilts but by the same means, I love solid color and the use of negative space which I feel connects me to the new modern quilting movement. I consider myself a modern traditionalist because I love making traditional quilt blocks but I like doing it in a modern way and arranging my quilts using an alternative grid and using modern fabric.
So, My Modern Voice was my quilt that represents me and my current quilting viewpoint. I sketched it out sometime last year and started it with the intention of having it finished to apply at Quiltcon. But even though we sometimes have good intentions, we don't always meet our deadlines. I did however, finish it in time for our local quilt show in March.
One of our modern quilting group members who is also a member of our local guild, was in charge of arranging the quilt displays. We had about 12 or so quilts that we marked "modern" and she hung them all together. We were all so grateful to Mrs. Sheryl for doing this for us. I think it made our modern quilts stand out more and hopefully started a voice growing in our community about modern quilting.
My Modern Voice
50 inches by 50 inches
All solids are Kona cottons
I used a jelly roll of Mediterranean Dreams from Quilting Treasures which I cut into 2.5 inch squares.
I used some of the jelly roll strips to make the scrappy binding.
The back of the quilt is made from more patchwork, more solids and also some of the yardage from the Mediterranean Dreams line.
I quilted it using the Serpentine stitch on my machine to mimic how the inspiration quilt was quiltied. I used navy 50 wt. Aurifil thread for the quilting.
Quilt back. Notice the label - I'm really a stickler for labels now.
Quilt binding.
My local Modern quilting group had a challenge for Valentine's. I announced the challenge in November to give everyone plenty of time to have their projects completed by the February meeting, so of course, mine was not finished. I think it still needed binding.
We could do anything we wanted for the challenge, it just needed to have a Valentine theme. I chose to do a table runner because I love table runners and you can never have too many. Right? (haha)
I also chose to do paper piecing because I love it so and it's my "go to" technique. I used Mini Love Quilt pattern from Sew Mama Sew which I've used before. Instead of arranging the letters in a square, I just went straight down with them. I made 2 rows and to finish the rows off, I paper pieced little hearts. The heart pattern is from the book 365 Foundation Quilt Blocks by Linda Causee that I've mentioned before. I added the black text fabric around the hearts until I had them the size that I wanted.
I used a charm pack of Moda Kiss Kiss for the letters. For the parts of the letters that were to long for 5 inch charm pack blocks, I used solid Kona Cotton. I didn't keep track of all the colors of Kona I used but as you can tell, it was shades of aqua, pink, and red.
The black and white chevron stripe fabric that I used as sashing between the rows is why I call this piece "Psychedelic Valentine". The motion of the fabric hurts my eyes and it felt very psychedelic to me. I think it is a fabric from one of the Moda Halloween lines.
I quilted it on my new Juki TL2010Q. I FMQ'd loopy lines in the letters with red thread - 50 wt. Auriful.
The psychedelic black sashing fabric has long squiggles quilted on them from top to bottom. I used black thread, also 50 wt. Aurifil, to quilt it and you can't see it at all from the front. Only from the back. I didn't quilt anything in the black spaces or in the heart blocks. I just felt like this was enough.
Speaking of the back, here it is! I used my remaining charm squares to make the back of the runner and I used a large piece of this pink Dear John fabric that I've been hoarding. You can see all the quilting so much better from the back.
I used charm square scraps for my label and zig zagged it down with the black thread. I love making labels this way. It is from a tutorial by Kelly from My Quilt Infatuation. I never forget my labels now. They are just a part of the back of every quilt.
My binding is a red fabric with aqua dots that is a part of the Kiss Kiss line.
My Psychedelic Valentine measures 18 inches by 32 inches.
I hope you enjoyed my Valentine project and reading my blog. Please come back to visit anytime!
**Linking up to
My Quilt Infatuation for Needle and Thread Thursday and to
Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday
