QUILTS & FABRIC: PAST & PRESENT


Wednesday, September 30, 2020

No Quilt Market This Fall: Virtual Everything

 


No virtual booth this October because the annual Houston Quilt Market has, of course, been canceled.



The old George Brown convention center will be empty.

Quilts, Inc. has, however, scheduled a virtual market for the trade in January, 2021.


But what about my new fabric and book and patterns scheduled for 
fall introduction?

How about a slide show about me and my new products...


The video is meant for quilt shops but everyone is
welcome to see it.

Here's a link to the video if clicking above doesn't work.


Thank you, very much!

Saturday, September 26, 2020

Reproduction Chintzes 2020

Anne's English Scrapbox by Di Ford

Fans of reproduction prints are celebrating the current crop of early repros. Several collections echoing pre-1850 chintzes (and rainbow stripes as above) are now available.


A vase with a crackle background and some Asian influence

Anne Varley by Petra Prins and Nel Kooiman,
Dutch Heritage
Dutch fabrics require a little more searching to buy them (and a little more cash)
but they are worth it.


Jane Austen at Home captures the look of the Indiennes in
the Jane Austen family quilt in the collection of her Chawton home

Indiennes---the look of prints from India, fanciful flowers scattered about.

Reproduction of the Austen quilt



 Christopher Wilson-Tate has also captured the look of Indiennes in his 
Regency Romance collection.


Regency Romance includes a PANEL!


The large print from Betsy Chutchian's Elinore's Endeavor
is another Indienne---the white background was common
200 years ago.

On line auction---quilt 1830-1850

It's time to go shopping and buy fabric for an authentic-looking
medallion repro.

Tuesday, September 22, 2020

Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns Back in Print

Announcing: A new and improved version of my Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns.
The third edition.

The second edition was published in 1993 and
has been out of print for years.
(You ought to see how battered and taped together my copy is.)

Making it one of the most searched for books on Amazon.
And offered in one of the most ridiculous ads there.
Do NOT pay $919.00 for a copy.
Wait a few months you can have a new edition for just about what this version
originally cost about 30 years ago.

Christmas presents for everybody!

Some of you may still have the first edition, photocopied for a notebook, begun in 1979.

It's about time for a new edition and it has been a formidable task. There are over 4,000 black and white sketches in there and somebody had to redraw them all more accurately and in color.

That would be Ann and Sara at Electric Quilt
where they published the electronic version BlockBase software 
(also out of print---but returning next year---
We realized we can only do one project at a time.)

The book is definitely NEW but how is it IMPROVED?

1) Better drawings and colored examples showing how the pattern
was originally shaded.



2) Better organization and easier to read with both names, sources & illustrations
on the same page.

3) Over 150 new blocks including published patterns I'd missed earlier.


And new additions drawn from old quilts where
the pattern may not have been published.



4) And it's a whole lot prettier book---Thanks to Sara.


You may not have an old edition of the Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns and might wonder why you need this book.

Many will attest that it is a useful item:
"What a great book! If I want to know what a certain pieced quilt block looks like, this is the book I use. I never knew there were so many blocks! I want to try them all!!! A great book, and everyone should have this book in their library." A kind review on Amazon.

 Here's what you can do with it.....

Identify quilt patterns
(It's a Kansas Troubles)

Have thousands of ideas at your fingertips.

Use pattern names to design theme quilts
(if one, say, had a nautical friend.)

Patterns are easy to find because the categories are grouped
by seam lines, with similar blocks next to each other.

So you can use the page layouts to design samplers based on construction types,
for example, saw tooth stars. Professionals rely on it.

Daredevils by Becky Brown
Daredevil piecing from the hard-to-piece Miscellaneous blocks.

You need the new edition and you can save big bucks if you pre-order....


Price to be determined: We have to finish it to price it out.
When: We are hoping to deliver December 1.
Check back to pre-order on October 1.

Christine at EQ gives me these links:


Info about pre-ordering and discounts: https://electricquilt.com/pre-order-and-save/

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs): https://electricquilt.com/online-shop/encyclopedia-of-pieced-quilt-patterns/#tab-FAQ

General product info: https://electricquilt.com/online-shop/encyclopedia-of-pieced-quilt-patterns/

Friday, September 18, 2020

Fabric & Sets for Flora Delanica Quilt BOM 2020-21


12 applique blocks drawn from cut-paper collages created in the late-18th century by Mary Granville Delany 

We're beginning a Block of the Month based on Mrs Delany's florals on October 15th. Here's planning information for fabric and setting ideas. 

For an idea of what's in store see the British Museum, which owns most of Mary Granville Delany's Flora Delanica collages, her "paper mosaiks" done in the 1770's and '80s. Here's a link to a search for Mary Delany: 1,005 hits.  Scroll around. You'll see our inspiration.


Mary who lived from 1700 to 1788 was an extraordinary woman who lived a fascinating life. She's often characterized as a remarkable old lady inspired to begin an artistic career at the advanced age of 72 (72!!!) but as you will see in the monthly stories she had a life-long interest in art and botany and hobnobbed with 18th-century's giants of botany, music and literature.

Backgrounds for the Applique
Mrs Delany’s flowers are rather long and narrow as flowers tend to be and the patterns fit well on an 8-1/2 x 11 sheet of paper you can print yourself. Applique these on the diagonal to a 10 inch finished square (or larger).

About 42" x 56-1/2"

The Official Set

Twelve blocks set on point: Each square in a square will finish to 14-1/8" (Sorry but that's American arithmetic for you.) 14.125 inches.

Cut those pink triangles by cutting squares 8" and then cutting each
in half diagonally, 2 squares per block---24 in all.

EQ8, which drew the pattern, says you'll need 1-1/8 yards of the pink (or whatever)
and 1-1/4 yards of the dark backgrounds.

36” x 48”
27" x 48
 
Another option is to applique them to rectangular blocks finishing to 9” x 12” and set them in strips.
(Maureen is better at arithmetic than I am.)

Background Colors 

Me: Auditioning backgrounds back in March.
 Browns out.
I used a variety of dark reds, blues, greens and purples.

We're NOT doing Mrs D's Poinciana---sticking with the somewhat
simpler collages.

Our inspiration florals are paper collages-- colored paper shapes glued to black backgrounds, which Mrs D. painted with India ink. To capture her dramatic effect you will want very dark backgrounds.

Denniele is using a wide stripe for background, inspired by
 a student's favorite fabrics.




She hasn't cut it up into rectangles but is using one piece of  stripe, marking off the rectangular boundaries with basting. Her background is width-of-fabric x about 72" to allow room for some applique that will be the "sashing" and an applique border.  "I imagine it will be shorter than the 72" but didn't want to make that final cut until I am finished."

You might want to just focus on the blocks and cut a single background piece 36-1/2" x 48-1/2".

Blocks will be effective on light backgrounds too.  

Inverting the color on Mrs. D.'s blocks in Photoshop
gives you ideas for a different look. Each month I'll
give you links to another of her 1,000 collages for inspiration.

Janet's thinking of a single variegated grunge ground. I think she
should save the bottom one for flowers and stick with
the darkest.

Be careful with medium value backgrounds as flowers and leaves may not show up. 

Becky Brown's appliqueing to 10" finished blocks (cut 10-1/2")  
of  dark blue.
Becky: "My blocks are 12", set on the diagonal. I keep the design inside a 9 x 12" area so design fits an 8.5 x 11" format....My background fabric is a deep navy blue, hand-dyed fabric from Vicki Welsh's Colorways. Her fabrics are wonderful - beautifully dyed and easy to needle."


You can squeeze 12 squares cut 10-1/2" out of a yard of background fabric but you might be happier with a yard and a half.

Fabric for the Applique
Mrs D.'s genius was using colored paper to get an accurate picture of the plant. She snipped from  a variety of paper, some like tissue paper, some from India and China. And she painted & dyed her own colored paper. Occasionally she added watercolor after she was finished gluing. (You could add detail with fabric markers and fabric pencils.)

Becky's using Vicki Welsh's "stash pack" fabrics.

One appealing idea is using batiks or hand-dyed variegated color fabrics to imitate detail as Becky is doing. The applique pattern shapes are simple. You could add complexity based on Mrs D's work or leave them simple relying on color.

Becky's using a lot of Vicki Welsh's Autumn Greens
and Spring Greens.



Much of Mrs D.'s foliage tends towards olive greens and almost browns
so batiks or hand-dyed olives would be good too

For florals: Reds, pinks, oranges, yellows, violets and a little blue plus a variety of almost whites that show up well on the dark backgrounds. How much? Scraps and snips will do but of course the bigger the piece the more you can fussy cut the details.

A second fabric suggestion:
Shapes cut from contemporary floral fabrics. 

I'm diving into my large supply of very splashy prints to imitate Mrs  D.'s shading and line. Sort of drawing with fabric, a contemporary Broderie Perse.

Broderie Perse (cut-out chintz applique) in a quilt dated 1829

Bet you have some of these.

We're all doing some Broderie Perse, particularly for the floral centers.

Denniele's center 


She's also added line & shading to plain colors with Derwent  Inktense pencils.

https://blog.derwentart.com/2017/02/17/taking-inktense-off-the-page-working-on-fabric/

A more traditional approach: Use solids and then add details with embroidery as in the applique below by Deborah Kemball.


See her book from C&T.
Great style for botanicals.

The brilliant Sue Spargo is always inspirational.

Sue's Fresh Cut book

And speaking of embroidery:

Becky's friend Nancy Phillips has joined us. Nancy's appliqueing in wool on 9 x 12" blocks.

As Becky writes:
"Applique gives us each the freedom to make it our own, and we don't have to 'color within the lines' like piecing. Can't wait to see what everyone else will be creating. "
Mary Delany has been an inspiration to many artists, particularly in the last few years. Check out the Instagram page devoted to her.


Lots of pictures but very few textiles. We'll fix that.
We'll set up our own Instagram page and Facebook group in the next few weeks. Stay tuned.

Check out our Facebook Group: MARY DELANY QUILT

Post your favorite Mary Delany collages.