Student Work: “A Gardener’s Delight”
Check out the fabulous quilt made by Barb Gardener, called “A Gardener’s Delight.” (Click on it to see the details.) She created a wonderful composition, used color and contrast to create a focal point, and showed depth with the sizes of the flowers. Wonderful! And what about the shapes of the flowers? Don’t they have personality?
Click any image for a larger view
Barb made (or at least started) this quilt as a student in my “Design Your Own Nature Quilt” class.
The first word in the class title is “design,” so that’s where we start. After learning about format (overall proportions,) balance, contrast, and focal point, the students are ready to tackle their own designs.
Each student provides her own inspiration photo(s) and Barb had some fantastic ones.
As a matter of fact, her photos were so fantastic they made it challenging to choose a direction. This was evident in Barb’s early sketch, when the iris and poppy flowers were sort of competing with one another.
This is where our class theme came in: “Be inspired by your photo. Not controlled by it.” We discussed the idea of omitting a few flowers, and making the foreground ones MUCH larger.
While considering that, Barb got to work on her background. Lots of busy green prints were called for. She cut them jagged, with a technique I taught the students, and the loose quality of those cuts gave it a nice quality.
Early background: 
Soon, it was time for flowers, and I showed her how to use blobs of color to represent them. Much easier than fussy cutting! (Reference this photo to the first inspiration one.)
Our class ended at about this point, so my participation did as well. However, Barb had learned a lot and she still had access to the class lessons, so she forged ahead.
Still undecided about how many flowers to use, Barb auditioned both irises and poppies on her quilt. They were still fighting though.
Notice, however, the large tree on the right. The little bits of black added give it wonderful texture. Wasn’t she smart to notice the need for shadows? It’s very successful.
After some consideration, Barb rejected the idea of the irises and enlarged the poppies dramatically. Excellent! Now, THAT’S a focal point!
And here’s a detail shot. Awesome!
Can you see why this class is so exciting for those who take it? And for me to0? Barb’s process, along with the resulting quilt, are good examples of what can happen in the “Design Your Own Nature Quilt” class.
It will be offered again on May 30th, 2014. Perhaps you’d like to join in the excitement. Find full details here.
And be sure to check out Barb Gardner’s website. She’s a very talented quilt designer and teacher. Thanks, Barb, for allowing me to showcase your quilt and your process!
Ellen Lindner
Barb’s nature quilt is wonderful. I can attest to Ellen’s excellent class. She really helps one see and develop her own sense of what is right in a composition.
Aw shucks. 🙂 Thanks, Martha!