Fabric-Led Design

My latest quilt has been coming together nicely, even though the fabrics are a little bit diverse. The colors, patterns, and values of the fabrics have dictated what looks good where and the fabric sizes have determined what will actually fit where.

Things evolved on the design wall as I folded and auditioned fabrics in different locations. I didn’t cut them until I was pretty sure about what I was doing!

As you can see, I was trying to move the colors and patterns throughout. I was getting close, but I thought the two yellow fabrics on the right, below, needed a darker spot between them. This is one of the fabrics I auditioned as a solution.

You can see that I decided to use it, but in a much more narrow piece.

And the big surprise: I decided I liked the quieter parts of the quilt the best, so I removed the busy patterned piece that was on the far left.

This is the final version, before quilting.

BTW, the construction time on this quilt was very short, due to the large pieces of fabric. But, it’s taking me quite a while to quilt it!

Ellen Lindner