From UFO to Modern Quilt, Part II: Solids Rising

Desperately needing to get out of my house yesterday, and needing some yarn to finish a scarf I'm crocheting, I headed for the nearest Joann's fabric.While there, what the heck, might as well look at the fabric. Their pre-cut area - where they sell packs of coordinated fat quarters and 'jelly rolls' (2 1/2" wide strips) - is near the entrance, so that was the first stop in my shopping therapy. 

What I saw there amazed me. Solid fabrics now dominate. 

Not so long ago, the vast majority of Joann's pre-cuts were collections of print fabrics. But yesterday, most of the pre-cuts I saw were solids, in gradations, or rainbow colors, or other combinations. Gosh, they even have pre-cut strips that gradate from white through grey, all the way to black (Weird, huh? I'm guessing that's for all the hordes of people making "50 Shades of Grey" quilts?)

This tells me that "modern" quilting is a certifiable, money-making trend. Which is exciting, because just a few years ago the quilt world was collectively anguishing over imminent doom as quilters' average ages rose. Now it's looking like today's young "modern" quilters are saving our pastime/passion. You go, Youth!

Which brings me to a quilt I blogged about a couple of months ago, here. Here's how it looked then. 

 

I had pieced it in the early 90s from scraps of the solids that I was mostly using them, when solids were more popular, and there weren't nearly as many interesting prints around.  I was a total beginner, and the piece has many, shall we say quirks. 

After piecing it, I stuffed it, just a top, in my cabinet, where it sat for years. Among other things, it was was completely and utterly out of style. (This was also before the renewed interest in improvisational quilting, now very hot). 

I thought of it as a sort of magic doorway, with light coming in around the cracks. A few months ago, I decided to finish it. I backed and batted it, and stitched in the ditch. But I thought it needed something more.  I solicited and received many good suggestions. I especially liked the idea of  Israeli quilter Rachelly Roggel, who suggested a series of arches, in keeping with the doorway theme. She'd suggested doing them off-center, but for some reason I went with centering them; now I think off-center would have been a little more interesting.

I quilted circles into the blocks around the edges. 

More angles: 

Don't look too close.

Aside from the occasional beginner's crease, I like it, and I'm still tickled that a quilt I made so long ago is  au courant! I am thinking about whether I should sew a zillion colorful buttons to it, or leave well enough alone. Other than that, my biggest challenge is to clear some wall space to hang it!

Meanwhile, I broke my tripod (which is why these photos are a bit fuzzy). Can anyone recommend a strong, durable, but not outrageously expensive tripod?

Oh Frabjous Day! From UFO to Modern Quilt!

You know how you buy a stylish dress or shirt; stop wearing it when it's out of style; can't bear to throw it away because you loved it and/or it cost a lot of money and/or you are a hoarder; and then, 20 years later, you open your closet, take a look at it, and realize - oh frabjous day! -  that's it's totally in style again? (Whether it still fits is a different matter.)

That's kind of the story with this quilt. It was one of my first scrap quilts - before I had a lot of scraps. Those I did have were mostly solids. I started quilting with Eleanor Burns' Amish Quilt in a Day, a book which offers the classic Amish look of black set against multiple colors. I substituted purple for the black. So after I'd made maybe a half-dozen quilts, most involving tremendous amounts of purple, I decided to do something with the scraps. This concoction was the result.

Between about 1995, which is my estimate of about when I constructed the top, and last week, when I finally sandwiched and started quilting it, it sat in the dark on my UFO shelf. Every couple of years I would pull it out and contemplate. I liked the way it looked like a doorway, with light seeping in around the edges, surrounded by inexplicable triangles. I disliked all those solid fabrics, some remarkably ugly. The wonkiness bugged me. It contains every beginner mistake in the world: some selvages included(?!); and the fabric isn't all good quality. The uneven triangular partial log cabin blocks set on point along the outer edge are an inexplicable act of chutzpah. The measurements are about 37" (at the widest points) x 72".  What kind of a quilt is that?

When I pulled it out a couple of months ago, I was struck by how "modern" it looks.  With the modern quilt movement, wonkiness is in, so are solids, and improvisational piecing with no matched points. This quilt fits the bill. Hooray, I'm suddenly modern!

Last week, I pressed it, added backing and batting, and then did  a stitch in the ditch with invisible thread throughout. I'm not liking the pillowy effect, and thinking of maybe going over the whole thing with a closely-spaced diagonal machine quilting....or big stitch sashiko-style diagonal quilting....or what? Suggestions welcomed!

I don't know if I could make something this improvised again -  not without a LOT of planning!

UPDATE 2/2013: I decided on a quilting design and finished quilting this piece here.