Adventure Quilter
Ellen Lindner uses fabric the way a painter uses paint, with extraordinary results
Here’s a little gift for you: a free online class about facing a quilt. It’s self-paced, so you can sign up and watch the videos whenever you’d like.
This class is set up just like my other on-demand classes, so you’ll get to see if this form of learning is a good fit for you.
Find the free facing class here.
Enjoy!
Ellen Lindner
P.S. If you face a quilt for the first time I’d love to see a photo!
In a recent post I suggested that, when making improvisational quilts, it’s a good idea to get the proportion of colors set before any construction begins. Yet, I ignored my own advice on my latest quilt, Melting Pot.
It all began when I fell in love with a painting by Jane Davies. Great colors, right? It’s called Common Thread 1.
Although the colors are quite disparate, I decided I would use them as a springboard for a new improvisational piece. (However, when I printed out this reference photo, the colors came out much more subdued, which affected the fabrics I used.)
As with any improv quilt, I started by selecting the fabrics I would use and sewing them together in pairs. This is what it looked like at that stage.
Pretty ugly, right? Clearly, I’d have to add interest by slicing and dicing to create a variety of shapes and sizes. And I strongly suspected that I would decrease some of the colors as I went. I jumped in.
Even the first little bit of manipulation made it look better.
So I did more.
At this point I didn’t care about making square-ish units. I was just trying to create interest. It was definitely getting better as smaller shapes were created.
I decided to scale back on the yellow, orange, and tans, and to pump up the teals, reds, and blacks.
The little skinny strips add a lot of energy, don’t they?
At this point, it was getting pretty large and I was having second thoughts about the size. Then, I remembered another call for art requiring a quilt that’s 1′ wide by 4′ high. I realized I had enough units to make 2 quilts! Yippee! In the photo above, I’ve separated them. The 6 units on the left would go into my original quilt and the 3 (stacked) on the right would become a 1′ x 4′ piece.
And here’s the finished quilt, Melting Pot. Whew, that was challenging!
And a detail shot:
I’ll show you the companion quilt soon.
Ellen Lindner
The style of improv (no pattern) piecing I do evolves greatly during the construction of the quilt. Which is one of the things I love about it. I do a lot of slicing, repiecing, slitting, and slanting, all without a construction plan. With such a loose technique the color and value selections become critical. These must be done at the beginning. If done properly you’ll be able to wildly “slice and dice,” as I call it, knowing that you’ll be happy with the results.
Take a look at this improv quilt, In the Moment.
In the Moment
You can clearly see that blue-green is the dominant color and orange is the accent. I used a variety of each color, with a good bit of variation. The blue-greens are sometimes just blue or just green. Some are dark and others are medium, plus they have different patterns. The same is true for the variation found within the orange fabrics. A note about pattern: many improv quilts are made with solid fabrics only. There’s actually a good reason for that: the piecing will create a lot of pattern by itself and that will show up best with solid fabrics. However, I like to use near solids and a little bit of patterning here and there.
In addition to your main colors you’ll want some neutral fabrics, some lights and some darks. Can you see those in my example?
After selecting a nice stack of each colorway, it’s time to think about color proportions. In this quilt I wanted the blue-green to be about 3/4 of the quilt, with the orange accents being about 1/4. Therefore, I cut my fabric sizes accordingly: the blue-greens were each cut about 3 times as big as the orange ones. To start, I sewed together one primary fabric and one accent and put them all up on the design wall. This was the time for me to adjust the ratio, if desired.
Here’s another example, Fruit Salad. This time I was inpired by a photo of a white and pink lily. There was greenery around it and grey in the background.
Fruit Salad
Again, I thought of my colors and their desired proportions. I pulled a lot of pinks and whites, and also a little red and peach. I added yellow-greens, including a dark one, and I rounded things out with several soft greys. It turns out that I cut those first few reds pretty large and they quickly took over. I spent a lot of time whittling them down as things progressed. All that red took me away from the soft colors of the lillies so I shifted gears to the idea of watermelon and other summer fruit.
The bottom line:
– THINK about the proportions of colors you want in your quilt. Plan the fabrics and their starting sizes accordingly.
– Don’t be afraid to switch gears mid-stream.
Enjoy the adventure!
Ellen Lindner
Whenever I show one of my improv quilts, people ask if I’m going to teach the technique. I don’t have any plans to teach it right now, so I thought I’d show a little about it here on my blog.
There are LOTS of different ways to make improvisational quilts. You’ll find many tutorials on YouTube. Some methods are rather formulaic with predictable results, and others are very loose and unpredictable. As you might guess, I prefer the latter.
One method I employ early in my process is what I call staggered piecing. I learned it from Pat Pauly on an episode of Quilting Arts. It starts with two or more fabrics joined together.
You slice them into two pieces across the primary seam line and the two pieces are joined back together, but intentionally misaligned. This can be repeated, which is what I typically do. So, I’ll get something like this.
You can stagger the pieces a little or a lot. And the slicing can be done with straight lines or with gentle curves, as I did.
Here’s another example.
As you can see, the edges of these units become skewed, and that’s okay. Don’t trim them off, because it’s still very early in the process.
One more example:
The staggering adds a lot of energy, doesn’t it? For me, that’s kind of the main reason for using improv piecing. I use it when I want an energetic piece that evolves as I go.
Would you like me to share more tips about improv techniques?
Ellen Lindner
P.S. See another improv quilt, and another.
I did a second fun Zoom class with the Ann Arbor gals. This time it was Double Reverse Appliqué.
They made great progress. Just look.
Jennifer chose muted colors and they worked beautifully. (BTW, the focus on Zoom is great. It’s reduced here because the image has been copied and manipulated so many times.)
Colleen finished in just a few hours. Can you tell she’s pleased with her results?
Susan used a fabric which featured a subway map of New York City. So, you can guess the name of her piece: “The Big Apple.” I love it!
Claudia took both classes and had great results both times.
June had taken the class before and had already made an apple. So, she jumped ahead and made a pear.
Later, she sent me a photo of the finished project. Great, right? Don’t you love the way the value changes make the pear (or apple) look 3D?
June was pretty taken with this technique and designed another pear of her own. She had fun mixing up the colors and I think the results are fantastic.
Susan also sent me photos of her finished projects. Here’s her “Big Apple.”
And her pear. Nice!
All of these ladies did a great job! We had no trouble communicating via Zoom and it was a lot of fun.
If you want to try this technique, you can learn via my eBook, or my on-demand class. (Or, of course, tell your guild program chair to “bring” me to your guild.) There are so many great ways to learn these days!
I hope you’ve had some fun learning opportunities during this pandemic time.
Ellen Lindner
It sure is great to be able to interact with students and teach, via Zoom, to people across the country. I recently taught “Floral Improv” to a group of students in the Ann Arbor, MI area. They all did an excellent job and these late-in-the-day screen shots are proof.
Woah, Grace got a LOT of flowers and foliage cut and placed, didn’t she? She’ll add black stitching to the flowers to add interest.
Working alongside her was her young friend, Emma. She’s only been sewing a few months, but she had no problems with a new technique.
Claudia’s colors were actually much more vibrant that this, but this gives you an idea. (Claudia, I cropped you out because your eyes were closed.)
Laura settled on her flower colors pretty quickly, but was still auditioning foliage fabrics late in the day. (The down side of having access to ALL your fabric when taking a class at home?)
Mary wanted her flowers to be the stars so she opted for very low contrast foliage. Can you see that she’s added black stitching to some of her poppies, already?
Lynne’s vibrant background fabric added another level of energy to her composition.
Showing me their work can be tricky, but Mary Beth had it figured out. She took a photograph with her phone and held it up to the web camera. Where there’s a will there’s a way!
Amy’s composition included a bird and a butterfly on her background fabric. They went well with her acid greens.
Jean is already outlining her palest flowers to add contrast. Can you see where she’s done it already? It really makes a difference.
Don’t you love how Wanda brought in a few flowers arcing down from the top right?
Nico got especially creative. She clustered her flowers and made a vase for them. A very nice option!
I had a fabulous day with these ladies and I think they’d say the same. It was SO wonderful to interact in this way after so many months of near isolation!
I strongly encourage your guild to get on the “Zoom wagon,” with me, or with some other teacher. It’s just way too much fun. If a workshop seems scary, start with just a lecture.
Information about my presentations.
Ellen Lindner
P.S. In this class students learn how to make two different types of flowers with no patterns. Then, they learn about composition and arrange their flowers. Leaves and stems are added last, and quilting begins. Students have already learned how to stitch their poppies with black thread in order to make them look more dimensional. Before you know it, it’s completely done.
What to do when the call for art requests ocean animals smaller than 12″? This is my result: two fish for SAQA’s “Fresh Fish” project.
These are made from scraps, most of them hand dyed.
I had fun adding a little hand stitching.
It turns out that this shape is VERY hard to turn right side out. The narrow spot between the body of the fish and the tail is a problem. But, I’m happy with the result.
I’ll be mailing these off soon.
SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) wants to receive 250 and anyone can donate, so join in if you’d like!
Ellen Lindner
I’m really loving my latest quilt, Fruit Salad.
When I was a kid, at least once per summer my parents would get a watermelon, chill it, and then make a big to-do about eating it outside as part of an evening picnic. We ate it outside because my 3 siblings and I made a MESS with that watermelon! We had juice dripping down our chins and, of course, we had to have contests to see who could spit the seeds the farthest.
As this quilt developed that’s what it made me think of. Thus, the name. 
A detail shot:
This quilt was originally inspired by a photo of lillies. As it evolved, the stronger colors became dominant, and I was disappointed. But, I reminded myself that the inspiration photo was just that – inspiration. If it got me motivated to try something it had served its purpose. With that in mind, I looked at the quilt with new eyes and fell in love with it. I hope you like it too.
Purchase details and more info.
Ellen Lindner
P.S. A design note: can you see how important the neutral white and grey are? Can you imagine the quilt without them?
I’ve been having so much fun working on this improvisational quilt. (See the previous two posts for more in-progress photos and explanations.)
After LOTS of piecing, slicing, and repiecing, I finally thought the quilt sections had enough energy and excitement to start thinking about how to put them together. First, I looked for sections with similar dimensions and cut them so they could be pieced into rows. This involved making another few blocks to fill gaps. And finally, I had the sections arranged and ready to be pieced together.
Here it is, completely pieced. Of course, it shrunk again.
For quilting, I thought I could play up the curving lines. I drew some reference arcs and here’s the quilting in-progress.
And a detail shot, again, in-progress.
I think the quilting really adds a lot!
Ellen Lindner
Improvisational piecing is really a lot of fun. You sew and slice and reassemble and trim. As you go, the pieces get smaller and things get much more energetic. See where I left off last time.
It was time to downsize some of the colors. This one below, for instance. It had a really large section of green. So, I just sliced it, joined new fabrics in and turned it into two blocks.
Can you find the new blocks in this collection?
It was time to add in some narrow strips. I really love these! They add a lot of interest, but because this is improv, nothing has to match up. This photo shows that I’ve sliced through this block and sewn on the first side of a narrow fabric strip. (3/4 -1″ wide)
There’s no need to match seams when sewing the second side of the strip. Leave a big seam allowance and just lay things in place, (parallel) so you’ll catch both pieces when sewing.
Then, flip it over and sew the second seam referencing the first one. Use whatever distance you like to determine the finished width of the strip. Press seams out and trim off the excess seam allowance.
Ta-da! Pretty neat, huh? You can do the same thing with a gentle curve.
See how much energy they add?
At this point, I began to study what was happening on the design wall and making more purposeful changes. I realized I had missed the mark with my color selection. That’s because I used too much of the darkest red. Not only that, but since it provided some of the highest contrast, it was taking over a little bit. I knew I’d need to reduce the size of the red pieces. And, since they were inspired by flowers, I thought I wanted to make them more triangular, so they wouldn’t be so chunky. On with the plan.
After a bit more work, these blocks had been altered. Much better, don’t you think?
See the three little dark brown dots? They were inspired by the dark stamens in the flowers. They started as a rectangle. Which I then turned into a narrow strip. Which I eventually sliced and repieced off-kilter. I liked them.
I should have this mostly finished by my next post.
Ellen Lindner