I LOVE these quilts!

I haven't done an I LOVE this quilt! post for a long time, so I thought I would look at 3 quilts today.

These 3 belong to 3 different flickr friends, all have flickr names that honor their dogs, past and present. I will look at their quilts alphabetically -- by the dogs' names!

The first one was made by Rosie at the boris daily. It doesn't have a name yet, in fact it isn't actually a finished quilt yet. But I have loved this from when it was just parts! The pattern is Gypsy Kisses by Material Obsession. But Rosie has taken their bright, cheery quilt and interpreted it with Denyse Schmidt's Greenfield Hill and turned it both Gothic and  whimsical -- if film director Tim Burton ever decided to make a quilt, this is the quilt he would make! It is mostly a single fabric line quilt, but there are touches of other fabrics that add sparkle. I am eager to see how she quilts this beauty.



The second quilt was made by Gretchen at bigredoscardog. She has made chunky, improvisational log cabins using three colorways of a single print plus solids. Most of the solids are obvious choices, coordinating with the prints, but there are some surprises here -- like, where did those oranges come from!? But I am so glad they are there! I like how she sometimes seems to start to build a log cabin, then it sort of disappears into the background. And the background -- love that peanut-buttery brown. It is quilted simply and looks like a quilt I would like wrapped around me on a chilly winter night.



Lastly, let me share with you John's Birthday Quilt, made by Lisa at Shiner's view. This is another improv log cabin quilt. These cabins are drawn with a finer brush and done in olives, aquas, blues and just a spot of yellow. Primarily stripes and solids, the crisply pieced blocks make for a tailored-look. This is another quilt where the blocks sometimes blend into the background, in fact sometimes there is *just* background. But this quilter isn't afraid of all that white space, she is a master at meander quilting.



Three different quilts, I LOVE them all!

I LOVE this quilt!

This quilt is called "Two Brothers" and was made by helen richards quilts.

It breaks the mold of the row-by-row, block-by-block quilt. The large, rectangular pieces let the interesting fabrics and the rich, vineyard-like palette come to the front, but the fabrics and colors are not working by themselves here. It took a good eye and a deft hand to assemble them in a way that is both calming and exciting. The rich, dark solids are enlivened by the sparkling prints and the piecing is at once improvisational and controlled.
The construction seems to have been done in 3 wide and 2 slender bands, going the width of the quilt, using both wide and narrow strips--a perfect way to really showcase the beautiful Japanese fabrics. The coral and olive and purple and turquoise of the prints really sing next to the forest and navy, plum and grey solids. The overall impression is that of peaking through a window at a beautiful scene outside.
It is hard to get a feel of how this quilt is quilted. Because of its size, it may have been done simply--though this quilter is known for her excellent free-motion quilting designed to uniquely enhance each of her quilts. In the case of "Two Brothers" perhaps the best quilting was just 'in the ditch' letting the amazing patchwork and beautiful fabrics shine!

 

My challenge from this quilt is to experiment with large fabric pieces in a non-block format. This style of quilt would be perfect for those fabrics I am reluctant to cut. I would also like to play with this rich palette--I don't think I have ever used as many dark colors as are in this quilt!

Please find this quilt in my flickr gallery I LOVE these quilts!.

I LOVE this quilt!

Ombre fabrics--fabrics that change color or pattern from selvedge to selvedge--have been around for a long time and I have always steered clear of them because I didn't know how to use them.
Well, friends THIS is how you use them!



This quilt, called simply Circle Quilt by MariQuilts, almost seems to breathe because of the masterful use of the ombre-d fabrics. The multi-colored stripe serves as a springboard for the colors brought in and they are pretty much all represented! Light and dark, warm and cool--the balance is perfect. And the black and white counter-stripe adds a counter-point to all the color.
This is a classic example of simple patchwork letting the fabric do the work. What could be simpler than large blocks of framed, bisected circles? But I am never bored looking at this quilt. It almost seems to radiate. And to further the feeling of radiation, the quilting outside the circles is done with variegated thread in a sun's rays pattern. Within the circles spirals are quilted and in the framing bands is a loopy, brick-like pattern.
The maker shows the quilt hanging above a grandchild's crib. The lucky baby would not even need to covered by this quilt to be warmed from it!

This quilt challenges me to break out those ombre fabrics. Large, simple shapes will put the fabric to its best use. And stripes, stripes, stripes.

Please find this quilt in my flickr gallery I LOVE these quilts!

I LOVE this quilt!

Today I am looking at a Very Merry Merry-Go-Round by RachaelDaisy.



I'm not sure where to start with this one. There is SO MUCH there. The block is the challenging and old-school Queen of May. But there is nothing old fashioned about the way it was interpreted here. I think every color in the spectrum is represented and while the palette is wildly exuberant, it is a controlled exuberance: the brights and the pales, the darks and the lights, the patterned and the plain--it all balances out. The skillfully pieced blocks on their fields of bright polka dots are further balanced by the sashing of intuitively string-pieced bands.
There aren't many solids in this quilt. And the prints are a little bit of everything; there are cupcakes and sugar skulls, puppies and paisleys, fruits and flowers and flamingos, and lots and lots of dots! The lucky person who got this quilt (the caption makes it sound like it was a gift) would never get bored looking at it!
This image doesn't show the quilting, but other images in RachaelDaisy's flickr stream do. The detail we see shows hand quilting using a heavier thread (it looks blue). On this quilty version of a bear-hug, the addition of hand quilting is like a gentle kiss on the forehead.
The challenge I take from this quilt is to try a block that I don't think I can make--I have always admired these wheeled blocks but have never ventured to try to make one. I would also like to try beginning a quilt that had neither theme nor color range. This quilt makes me want to just jump in and sew!

You can find this quilt in my flickr gallery "I LOVE these quilts!".

I LOVE this quilt!

I want to start a recurring feature that I am calling "I LOVE this quilt."
In it, I will choose an especial favorite from my flickr favorites and analyze why I like it so much. These will never be quilts of my own making; I will always identify the maker's flickr name and name they have given their quilt. I hope the makers might be flattered that I have chosen their quilt to write about or at least not mind that I do so. If I include your quilt here and you do not wish it to be, please just let me know and I will remove it. I also hope that others will enjoy reading about these quilts and my exploration of what about them pleases me. But I have to admit that my main reason for doing this is selfish: I hope by really thinking about these quilts that I look at again and again and trying to understand why I love them, it might make me a better quilter.

First in this series is "Wonky Squares" by SilaiBunai.



I think this quilt is like a haiku! It says so much with an economy of color and piecing.
There are only five fabrics and they have all been re-purposed from other household uses. I would love to be able to examine it closely to see the fabrics that were clothing in their previous lives: Lungi and Salwar-Kameez! The calming palette of shades of brown and cadet blue make for a serene quilt while the wonkiness of the squares give it just a bit of an edge. This quilter has a good eye for combining colors and real ability for improvisation piecing. I like the broad bands of color around the chocolate-y brown print (I tend towards thinner, fussier bands). It looks to have been machine-quilted with an over-all meandering stitch that just brings the whole thing together.
(The setting for the photo perfectly suits the quilt too!)
The challenge I take away from SilaiBunai's quilt is to do more with less and to experiment with intuitive piecing and to use wider strips. The quilt shows that one does not need the latest line from the top designers to make something amazing. All she needs is vision!

Find this and future "I LOVE this quilt!" quilts in my flickr gallery.