Monday, August 29, 2005

Free Motion Quilting Style, Baby!

Since Sonji just got a slick new machine and is about to dive into some serious quilting -- through the back even! -- and she has been musing about how the quilting line can add to the design of the quilt, I thought I'd share a conversation with you all that the Frayed Edges had while on our trip to Manchester. (A very long convoluted poorly written sentence. My apologies.)

Kate is working on an amazing quilt that was commissioned by someone who wants a fabric rendition of the topographical map of her area. Kate showed us the stunning piece in progress. Eight values of brown for the land elevations. More greens and I think some blue for the bay. The client wants to have the place names incorporated into the quilt. Kate also wondered how she would quilt it.

Sarah said she would write the names with Pigma pen and quilt the contours of each elevation shape. Echo style. This would accentuate the shapes and show off the work of the design.

Kathy said she would machine quilt the names right onto the quilt. She is great at free motioning words.

I said I would rubber stamp the place names and use my all-over-pattern quilting which would make the different shades blend together more. (And keep down any stray edges that wanted to peel up.)

I'm not sure what she has decided to do. But, isn't it interesting how we all had such immediate different ideas? It made me think that even if I feel like I don't have a personally recognizable style, it must be developing.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Whenever Deborah mentions me in her blog I feel like a celebrity. That shows you how small my world really is, I suppose. I sure hope our Frayed Edges discussion prompts many of your ring people (ringers?) to log in their votes about quilting my map. I welcome more feedback on how to procede. And I feel so blessed to have you all to coach me. I really love learning from you.

Sonji Hunt said...

It's hard not seeing the piece, but I can see where all three methods would work. That helps, doesn't it Kate!

Deborah and I are both very fond of rubber stamps and all sorts of mixed media things. I have no idea what I would do at all. Once again, that helps. But, if you want it to really look like a map, then that echo quilting seems like a good idea.

Sarah Ann Smith said...

What Kate said LOL! But Deb... you DO have a style...I can recognize your pieces easily! As they say, the artist is usually the last one to see the "them" in their own pieces.

And things rub off. When my friend Marie and I started dyeing fabric together, I was teals and ocean colors, she (a red-head) was russets and oranges. We cross-pollinated, and I ended up doing a series of autumn quilts, and she's taken up with the blues!

So what does this have to do with anything? Today I was working on Deb's pages for our round robin (gag...I hate that name for what we're doing...) books, and was wishing I had alphabet stamps LOLOLOL!!!! See...cross-pollination in effect, even in soggy Maine. Cheers, Sarah