One Patch Quilt - Row Houses

Work in Progress.

A new week and a new project! This quilt is everything that I love about fabric and patchwork. I love a scrappy quilt and working from stash ... I love working with contrasting - light/dark - fabrics especially playing with low volume fabrics ... and I love a simple patchwork design. I also enjoy a challenge and working with inset seams does exactly that. 

One-Patch Quilts (Twenty to Make)

This little book - One-Patch Quilts (Twenty to Make) by Carolyn Forster - caught my eye at the Melbourne Quilt Convention in April. At the time I was working on my Scrappy Apple Core Quilt and the image of the Apple Core Quilt on the cover of the book made me stop and flick through the pages of the book. In doing so I spotted a project with the cutest rows of houses and knew I needed to add it to my list of quilts to make. And so this book came home with me. It is only a little book, but it is a gem for inspiration!

A one-patch quilt is a quilt made from a single repeating shape and featured in the book is inspiration for 20 such projects - each a different patch - in order of difficulty, starting with a square and ending with an apple core shape. Further shapes included are half rectangle triangles, diamonds, kites, half and whole hexagons, jewel, and apple core shapes. The instructions are basic however if you are a sewer with some quilt making experience, and better still experience with inset seams, this is the a great book for ideas and inspiration.

On each project page there is a template for the basic shape at actual size. Rather than photocopy the shape and use a paper template to cut my fabric pieces, I resized my "house" shape so that I could quickly and easily cut a rectangular fabric piece with rotary cutter and ruler, then lob off the corners with a 90 degree angle ruler. I then also marked a ¼" seam line with a pencil around the shape to assist with sewing the inset seams that join the "rooftops" of the shapes together. A time consuming task but worth it for the sake of accuracy.

This quilt with it's many inset seams is not as difficult to sew together as it may look. It does involve a lot of stop/start sewing but you're still only sewing a straight line, and starting and stopping at a marked spot. Furthermore with this quilt design you are only ever working with two horizontal rows at a time when sewing the inset seams (rather than wrangling the whole quilt top under the machine). Once the "rooftop" rows are sewn together (a light row of houses + a dark row of houses), the remainder seams are all long straight seams.

QUILT DETAILS

One Patch Quilt - Row Houses

Quilt top measures 55 inches x 66 inches.

396 house pieces and 22 half-house pieces.
150+ different fabrics.
Machine pieced.

Quilt design from the book:

One-Patch Quilts (Twenty to Make) by Carolyn Forster.

Now ready for basting and quilting ....

More soon,
Rita

RELEVANT LINKS:
Book reference: One-Patch Quilts (Twenty to Make) by Carolyn Forster
More RPQ One-Patch Quilts
More RPQ Quilts with Inset Seams
RPQ TUTORIALS with Inset Seams:
Machine Piecing a Hexagon Quilt
Kansas Dugout Quilt Block Tutorial
Spool Block and Nine Patch Block Tutorial

Follow RPQ on:

Follow

COPYRIGHT: Do not copy or use any content or photos from my blog without my written permission. This is original content from www.redpepperquilts.com.

A Red and White Irish Chain Quilt

A finished quilt and a picture post ~

My quilt bucket list is long and on it are many quilts, in no particular order, that I would one day like to make. That one day finally came for a traditional Irish Chain Quilt, and a red and white Irish Chain Quilt at that. 

Denyse Schmidt: Modern Quilts, Traditional Inspiration: 
20 New Designs with Historic Roots

I have long bookmarked an Irish Chain Quilt in the book Modern Quilts, Traditional Inspiration: 20 New Designs with Historic Roots by Denyse Schmidt. This is such a great book! It is full of graphic - and beautifully photographed - modern quilts with a distinct nod to the traditional. I followed the instructions for the Irish Chain Quilt verbatim which included piecing sets of skinny strips from the full width of the fabric. This is definitely not my favorite way to piece a quilt top but I accepted the challenge and won. All's well that ends well. Admittedly it was a quick and efficient way to piece the quilt top.

Once the quilt top was completed I pushed ahead and basted the quilt in preparation for quilting. While I don't usually mark my quilt tops for quilting I did mark all the quilting lines for this quilt. The distance between patchwork units was just too great to trust myself to "eyeball" a straight line. I used a Clover Water Soluble Marker and a ruler to mark all lines prior to basting. The quilting ... took ages, but as always these closely spaced lines - just 3/4" apart - add so much texture to the quilt.

Once quilted I trimmed off the excess batting and dunked the quilt in a tub of cool water to remove the marked lines. The lines disappeared instantly! Concerned about possible color run from the red fabric I did add multiple Color Catcher sheets to the water. Thankfully the fabric was color fast and did not bleed (and no, I don't pre-wash fabric). I then tumbled dried the quilt on a gentle setting, giving the quilt a soft and slightly crinkled look and feel. All of the photos are of the washed and tumble dried quilt.

For the back of the quilt I have used go-to backing fabric: Newsprint in White from the Story Collection by Carrie Bloomston. The binding fabric is the same as the background fabric used for the quilt top: Robert Kaufman Kona Cotton in Natural. The binding was attached to the quilt after the quilt was washed and dried.

QUILT STATS

Red and White Irish Chain Quilt 

From the book: Modern Quilts, Traditional Inspiration by Denyse Schmidt

Finished quilt measures 55 inches x 55 inches.
Solid fabric used:
Robert Kaufman Kona Cotton in Natural
Robert Kaufman Kona Cotton in Tomato
Thread:
Aurifil 50wt (orange spool) for piecing.
Aurifil 28wt (grey spool) for quilting.
Low Loft Cotton Batting:
Warm & White batting from The Warm Company;
a low loft batting perfect for use with low volume and bright white fabrics.

This quilt is available for purchase from my Etsy Store.

See all the listing details here:

Modern Irish Chain Quilt 

Click on any image for a larger view.

I am so pleased with how this quilt turned out and I am happy to have it ticked off my quilt bucket list. Mind you, I don't think that this is my last Irish Chain Quilt, nor my last red/white quilt, or even my last quilt from the book by Denyse Schmidt.

As always, thank you for stopping by,

Rita

RELEVANT LINKS:

Red Pepper Quilts Etsy Store

Book: Modern Quilts, Traditional Inspiration by Denyse Schmidt

More RPQ Irish Chain Quilts:

Irish Chain Scrap Buster Quilt - A Tutorial

Irish Chain Scrap Buster Quilt - July 2015

Memoire A Paris Irish Chain Quilt - June 2016

Follow RPQ on:

Follow

COPYRIGHT: Do not copy or use any content or photos from my blog without my written permission. This is original content from www.redpepperquilts.com.

Patchwork Please!

Patchwork, Please! by Ayumi Takahashi

I am a huge fan and regular reader of Ayumi's blog - Pink Penguin - as well as a stalker of Ayumi's Etsy Store, so when Ayumi's book hit the stores I was on to it.  It arrived in my mail box late last week and I can tell you that the projects in the book reflect Ayumi's fun and playful style.  Ayumi has a unique eye for color and her quirky vintage patchwork style is one that I rather adore.

Patchwork, Please! includes a chapter on Tools and Materials but importantly also a section on Techniques (including comprehensive Paper Piecing instructions).  The projects in the book are divided into categories: for the kitchen, for kids, for the home, going places, and for crafting. It is in the for crafting section that you will find the Prettified Pincushion - also featured on the cover of the book - which I just had to make.  Or three ...

The instructions were clear and accurate - and although I wasn't confident that I could assemble the sides as neatly as pictured in the book, by simply following the step by step instructions I was able to complete the project successfully and eagerly made two more pincushions.  

Congratulations, Ayumi on a really great publication! There are many more projects in the book that I have bookmarked for making including the Swedish Bloom Quilt as well as a new set of potholders for my kitchen.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Also finished this week is a custom order; a re-make of the Liberty Patchwork Pillow Cover made earlier this month, and already on it's ways across the ocean.

This time around I have used a special hand screen printed fabric by Umbrella Prints - Perfect Circles Printed in Lily White on Natural Organic mid-weight cotton for the back of the pillow cover.

RELEVANT LINKS:
Patchwork Please! by Ayumi Takahashi
The Pink Penguin - Ayumi's blog
Linen Fabric used for Pincushions : : Essex Yarn Dyed Linen in Flax
Liberty Patchwork Pillow (April 5, 2013)

Thank you for stopping by,
Rita


Follow this blog with Bloglovin'

Marcelle Medallion Quilt - part 3

A picture post.

Well that was a week of my life well spent.  I have loved every moment of piecing this puzzle together, especially the fabric play.  Most of the fabric has been pulled from my scrap bin.  My scrap bin is a catalog (albeit a very disorganized one) of all of my favorite fabrics and using these itty bitty leftover pieces gives me much pleasure.

The finished size of my quilt top is 60.5 inches x 60.5 inches, slightly bigger than suggested in the pattern as my Flying Geese units in the fourth border are larger (although the ensuing borders have all neatly fitted in rather nicely as the quilt progressed).

I'll be sending my quilt top to my long arm quilter for quilting.  I will be sure to post pictures of the finished quilt as soon as it's done!

A few fabric details:

Border 1  (purple fabric)  Suzuko Koseki - Catch Letters

Border 3 - Green and White Stripe - Lecien House Designer, Atelier Akiko, Bonheur in Lime

Border 6 - Large Chevron - Riley Blake 

Border 8 - Amy Butler - Lotus - Wallflower in Cherry

Enjoy!

Rita

Relevant Links:

Marcelle Medallion Quilt is a pattern from the Book ~ Liberty Love by Alexia Marcelle Abegg

Marcelle Medallion Quilt - Part 2

Marcelle Medallion Quilt - Part 1

Marcelle Medallion Quilt - part 2

My Scrappy Marcelle Medallion Quilt is coming along nicely.

Monday was spent cutting and piecing umpteen Flying Geese units - most from fabrics scraps - only to realize on Tuesday that I in my endeavor to be productive I had misread the cutting instructions. Drat.  My mistake.  I came close to opting to turn my work in progress into a pillow cover ...

But, I don't like to quit, and with my Flying Geese units ready to go, I pushed on regardless and haven't looked back.  The following two borders are also finished.  

The quilt top is coming together really well, and I am pleased with my scrappy color/fabric arrangement.  Most of the fabrics are from my (2) over-turned scrap bins, the contents of which are now spread far and wide across the floor.  One more border to piece before that fabric mountain can be stuffed back into the bins.

RELEVANT LINKS:
The Marcelle Medallion Quilt is from the book Liberty Love by Alexia Marcelle Abegg

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

And last - the winner of the Day in the Country - Fat Quarter bundle is:

Congratulations, Laurajane!  Happy Stitching!

Thank you for stopping by,
Rita