First of all, I wish I was a better photographer. I found it very difficult to capture the dimension of the quilting in these snapshots. Anyway, let me tell you about my latest finished quilt. This project is a combination my last two blog entries: trapunto and antique linens. Starting from the beginning…
I received a call from a woman who was referred to me by Creekside Quilting. She told me over the phone that she had a pillowcase her grandmother had cross-stitched and she wanted to have it made into a wall quilt. After meeting together, we determined our objectives: make it look more Christmas-y, add a colorful border. Also, she said instead of a country look, she preferred an elegant style. I showed her the quilt that I had made for my grandma (shown in the Trapunto blog entry); she liked the trapunto, so we decided to add trapunto to her quilt, as well.
While shopping for fabric, I auditioned many colorful Christmas prints. None seemed to work. Most prints overpowered the simplicity of the monochromatic design. Finally, I decided on the green-with-red-stripe fabric (thanks, Jacque for your help with this). Definitely Christmas looking with a touch of elegance.
And then I looked at it for about a month not knowing what to do, praying for inspiration…
Ok…. hmmm…. Now what?
I worked up the nerve and without a plan, I decided to start by taking one step at a time. First, I separated the back of the pillowcase from the front. Ok, now we’re moving.
Then, I trimmed the design from the front of the pillow cutting only couple inches from each side of the original pillow front and squaring it up as much as possible.
Next, I added the green fabric as a 1″ finished mitered border around the design. It was beginning to take shape.
It needed more. I had saved the back of the pillowcase and decided to use that as another border because the color matched the center perfectly, and solid colors show off trapunto so much better than any printed fabric.
Well, the 2nd border of the red pillowcase fabric wasn’t long enough to go all the way around the perimeter of the quilt. This forced me to come up with another solution. I thought I would add corner blocks. I wanted to break up all the red in the quilt by adding white. I also incorporated a little bit of the red fabric (by this time I didn’t have much of it left) and lastly repeating the green color in the star points. Since the 2nd border finishes at a small 3″, I had to paper piece the star block I selected. Finally, my initial design work was done.
The quilting designs were another story. I had decided that I was going to do trapunto in the border. That’s all well and good, but because of the extra batting and therefore extra weight, trapunto needs to be evenly dispersed throughout the quilt top in order to hang properly.
I determined all the areas where I wanted trapunto and marked the designs on the quilt top. For the feathers, I sketched a curved spine on a piece of paper and was happy with the size so I traced it onto template plastic and cut it out. Using my new template, I traced each spine onto the quilt top with a blue wash out marker. Lastly, I drew the feathers free-hand directly onto the quilt top.
I quilted the traputo layer, trimmed the extra batting away and then quilted the whole top, batting and back together. I did lots and lots of micro-stippling around the trapunto.
After all that quilting, I was so relieved and excited when the time finally came to attach the binding and the hanging sleeve.
I can’t wait to give this to my customer tomorrow. I hope she will be pleased. I just love the thought of giving fresh life to something old and cherished, with a story all its own. What a neat thing to pass down to generations to come!