Herringbone Hearts...Anatomy of a Border

There was this experiment I just had to try.
I've been wanting to see just how far I could push the use of a single stitch in a crazy quilt, to put a greater focus on the threads and use of the supplies in general within the context, of well..... herringbone, without the distraction of the visuals caused by lots of combination stitches.
And this push of my personal CQ envelope involved some 38 mm silk ribbon. And pliers!

I started by laying out the "base" fabrics for the border, green silk that had been interfaced and then the edges sewn because it is very ravel-y and was going to be subject to some heavy stitching abuse.

I measured the distance across the quilt every 12" or so to make sure my strips were parallel as I pinned them on.  I knew that I had to applique them as I would never be accurate enough otherwise.  No turned under seam was necessary though, as it would be covered by trim later.

May the quality control expert took a break to look out the window while I was sewing on the green silk.
Then came the trim.

I got this green woven metallic trim off of Ebay from a seller of Indian sari silks.  There are lots of great trims to be found on Ebay!  I liked it for this quilt because it has hearts in it, and the metallic would add some shine.
So I pinned it in place...

....with many extra pins where the trim would cover the Evil Velvet.  Otherwise, no matter what, the trim would slip while I was sewing it down.
Ha, you velvet!  I own you.....

Corners are always a big deal in quilting--no avoiding that fact.  So I did my best to miter these neatly.

I forgot to photograph running that line of brown herringbone along the upper edge of the trim after it was sewn on.  I was too excited to try my experiment, using really wide silk ribbon in a herringbone stitch.  This is 38 mm from Dharma that I dyed.  It has a woven edge; it's not bias cut.  I needed it that way because it would shred as I pulled it through the silk otherwise.  But this ribbon, in a giant needle and pulled through with pliers for each stitch, held up perfectly fine.
It is really puffy, isn't it?

It was so big and wide that I used my finger as a laying tool as I pulled my stitches into place!

After the 38mm ribbon was on, I went back and wrapped the herringbone stitch above it along the trim.  I was going for more of a raised look and added just a little more color, to blend in with the stitching on the blocks.

This definitely changes the look and feel of the quilt.  It is exceedingly textural now.

In this picture I have ironed under the base border fabric and pinned it.  I will back the quilt later but this is about how it will look finished (squared up better though.)  I have to be very careful with the iron around that puffy herringbone because one false move and it is flat forever.

I'm going to be away teaching the next two week-ends so it will be a little while before I am back here..but I'll keep in touch by reading your blogs and will be posting to Facebook along the way as I travel to Santa Cruz, California and Olympia, Washington.  See you soon!

Commission Quilt: Barbara's CQ

It was a dream job....creating the blocks for a 3' X 4' crazy quilt for my new friend and student Barbara to embellish on her own. When she is all done, she will mail the blocks back to me for assembly and finishing.

I've been cranking hard on this all week, as I have other things in line to do, and I want to get her stitching right away. And as of 10 o'clock this morning, the 12 blocks are done and ready to mail.

I started with a trip to Fabric Depot for silks on Monday.

The room where this quilt will live actually has a very controlled palette of warm chocolate, spice, ivory, deep red......and just a flash of green in the paintings on the wall...

...as you can see if you click on the picture. There is lovely scrollwork over the window, repeated on the bed linens and elsewhere in the room that I decided to "pick up" in my blocks too. The quilt will be draped over the chair in the foreground.

So off I went. I wanted stay in total harmony with the room but to add some bright new music to it too.

As always, I used the design wall as I pieced. This shows Block #3 partly sewn and with other fabrics pinned up to guage their potential placement in the block.

And here is how a block in progress looks on the sewing table...

I always work well beyond the size of what the finished block will be. It gives me more options to shape the composition just a bit when it comes time to trim it to size.

This block is all sewn and ready for marking, basting, trimming, interfacing, retrimming, and then zigzag stitching around its perimeter. That's how I always prepare my crazy quilt blocks; this prevents fraying and those silks just want to fray in the worst way!
I used a very light batiste cotton for the foundation fabric this time to see how I liked it.
And I did like it, a lot. If I got distortions in it from my strange curved foundation piecing, the wrinkles ironed flat to nothing, especially after they were interfaced.

This looks rumply but it is actually very lightweight, flat, and smooth. I used "Touch of Gold" fusible interfacing which is sheer but does the job well.

All cleaned up and ready to go.

Here are a couple of the other blocks that I especially like. Remember, this is 100% improvistion as I work, no pattern....so I never know quite what I'm going to get until it is done. I will pin a partially sewn block into its place in the quilt on the design wall, and that does help me steer things a bit....but otherwise, I'm winging it!

This one is actually similar to the one shown above.
The chainstitched soutache on the red silk does echo the scrollwork in the room, so I made sure to use that fabric in each block.
I did leave at least one large-scale chunk of fabric in all 12 of the blocks, as Barbara wants to embroider motifs on a fairly good-sized scale, and needs that space.

These are each going to finish out at 12" X 12".

Here they are pinned up all together...

It will be so interesting to see what Barbara does with this "base" for her handwork!
I hope she enjoys the journey....it could be a long one. I'll let you know when she gets back...

Punchneedle Ribbon Flower Class

My friend KT organized this class for her friends in honor of her recent birthday. It was a chance for the ladies to have a whole day together, learn something new, and enjoy being waited on by the great staff at Donato Enoteca in Redwood City, CA.
None of these ladies had never seen a punchneedle before but they got the hang of it, as you will see.

Here we are in the banquet room we took over for the event, with class well underway.

They worked hard, and only one of them said she would hurl her punchneedle out the car window on her way home. She spent the day happily embroidering instead.

But mostly they were excited by what they learned.

Wendy just went for it, sewing her flowers right onto the sweater she was wearing!

And Sarah put hers on a hair clip.


KT, the birthday girl, was quite happy with her sunflower.

And then there was Barbara.....

She was ALL FOCUS...

....except when she looked up to smile at you.
She's done a lot of different kinds of handwork over the years, and the timing was right for this to zap her pretty good.
She decided she wanted to embellish a crazy quilt...but she doesn't sew...so I'm going to piece the blocks for her and she'll have a ball completing them.

I went to her amazing home the day after class to see where this quilt was going to live and get a sense of the colors and design she wanted.

This is the view down into her bedroom. The 3' X 4' quilt will be draped over that handsome silk covered chair in the foreground.

This shows more of the room and gives you an idea of the colors I'll be working with.
It's going to be very fun collaborating with this enthusiastic, creative, and high energy gal.

It was a great week-end! Thanks so much, KT!