A cheery hello to all of you. I hope this post finds you happy, dirty from digging in the dirt or thread covered from working on your latest sewing project! It’s summer, and we are all happy to be able to be outdoors with our friends. I haven’t written for a while, so this post will update you on some of the new quilts we have been creating and some customer projects that I’ve seen and know you will enjoy. But first, an update on a topic I asked about in the last post, and that was whether you would appreciate having access to the PURE Solids by Art Gallery Fabrics. Thanks to all of you who took the time to send me your thoughts. The consensus was that PURE solids are chemically pure (OEKO-TEX Certified) and of high thread count, so not tending to fray was of interest to many of you. As a result, I’ve brought in about 90 bolts of these solids. They have a beautiful hand and the palette is also lovely. They are $15.95/M, $14.50/Yd, a bit more expensive than other lower quality solids, but I think well worth it. Here are some photos of my new shelves.
New Kits & Patterns on Etsy
Top left is another version of my original Upside-Downside quilt. This one shows a navy version of the Japanese feature fabric with different circular designs. The middle and right top photos are two versions of a quilt I’ve called Pathways. I was so interested to see just how different the same design can look with two colour palettes. The bottom left is a quilt entirely of Japanese wovens, leading me to design something a bit traditional. It is a lovely quilt. The two right quilts on the bottom are designs that can be made with my Etsy quilt bundles containing 2one-meter cuts and 5 half-meter cuts. They are called Stalactite-Stalagmites and Key Lime, respectively.
Coming soon
new fabric bundles that are intended to be feature fabrics in a quilt of your choosing.
They will be available in either 7 FQ’s or 7 Half-yards. Right now, they are available at the studio here. So, if you are interested, you can email me or book a visit. For these bundles, I asked my daughter and a creative friend of hers to come and choose fabric combinations, operating on the theory that a different generation might make different choices than I do. It was so true! In all cases, the combinations were not something I would have come up with, but I like them all. Fun to have something different to offer! And if you are wanting to make a quilt for a grown child or their partner, these fabric combinations will be ones that you want to have a look at. They will be on my Etsy site in the next week or so.
Kintsugi - the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery
Many of you are familiar with the Japanese principle of wabi-sabi, embracing the imperfect in life. It can be applied to art, to our characters, to tangible items, to nature… but the principle remains the same… life is not perfect… learn to love that fact.
Growing out of this principle is the practice of Kintsugi, where broken pottery is made more beautiful than the original through the repair marks that are artfully added. A friend of mine, knowing my interest in Japanese culture and aesthetics, sent me a link to this BBC short film on the art of kintsugi. Here is for your enjoyment:
Finally, I have a couple of customer projects to show you, knowing that you will enjoy seeing them as much as I did.
The first is Betty H’s interpretation of my Desert Sun pattern in a palette of her own choosing. Once again, I am struck by the power of a palette to create such a different mood in a quilt. Shown here are Betty’s blue and yellow version, and my original version of Desert Sun. Some photos of quilts made by Mona using rescued silk ties. Mona would buy silk ties at church bazaars, and now she is making them into quilts.
And finally, Riva sent me this photo of her interpretation of my Nani Katachi quilt pattern. I love the subtlety of the colours she has chosen.
Riva has very carefully used value, the relative lightness and darkness of fabrics, to create movement in this quilt. So beautiful!
That, folks, is all for this time around. I wish you all a speedy second shot and an enjoyable summer. And I look forward to seeing any of you who might require a bit of fabric for your next project. Be well.