Showing posts with label Busy Bees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Busy Bees. Show all posts

Saturday 17 November 2012

#2 Butterfly Quilt - Techniques and Construction


Butterfly Quilt English Piecing Blocks
English Paper Piecing the Butterfly Quilt

Construction
The Butterfly Quilt was hand pieced, using the English Paper Piecing Method.  This involves tacking each piece of fabric over a paper template, to give it shape and structure, and then sewing the pieces together.  I tend to leave all the paper in until the top is complete, again, to keep its structure.  I find that this method leaves me with a dead flat top at the end. 

This was a great project.  I spent hours playing with fabrics from my stash and choosing the colour combinations.  It was a great portable project too.  I used my train journey to work to cover paper templates and piece blocks, and it went on many car journeys, as well as holidays to Amsterdam, France and the USA.  This is where all the action took place, and without a fuss, quietly the blocks came together. Once the blocks were together I decided it needed a border to frame it.  I pieced 2.5” x ¾” strips together out of the scraps, and that made up the border, along with calico borders. In a large quilt like this, don’t underestimate how long it will take to remove the paper templates!  For the back of the quilt, I used the same cream calico as on the front.
 
Before I put the sandwich together I needed to add the 64 antennae. The antennae of the butterflies are hand embroidered, using a backstitch, in a regular stranded embroidery cotton.

The wadding in the middle is 100% polyester.  All I remember about it is that I wanted one piece of wadding, and with the large quilt, my choices were limited.  I had also previously had a BAD experience hand quilting cotton wadding, which ‘bearded’ on a navy background, so I knew I wanted to give that a wide berth.  Having used the quilt daily for several years, I still really like the feel of it.
Quilting
When it came to the quilting, I knew I wanted to hand quilt it, but I didn’t know where to start.  As the top gradually came together, I knew I had to do something about it, so I booked onto a
Sandie Lush Hand Quilting Workshop, at Busy Bees, in Newport. That was a brilliant class, and I left with the confidence to start quilting the Butterflies Quilt.  I didn’t know what to quilt on it, so I made up my own pattern (not without MUCH deliberation), having outlined the butterflies, and ‘stitched in the ditch’ of their bodies.  I remember quilting this quilt quite distinctly. It was July and August in 2006.  It was HOT.  And I was underneath a quilt, hand quilting.  I was quilting to a deadline – I had entered it into the NEC Festival of Quilts in Birmingham, so it had to be done, ready for delivery in August.  Without the deadline, I think I would have done more quilting on it. 
Butterfly Block Scrap Quilt
Example of Butterfly Quilt Block
Once complete, I washed it in the washing machine.  I had been dragging this quilt around with me everywhere for a couple of years.  The cat had regularly sat on it whilst I quilted, and the heat of the summer meant that more recently, it had taken the brunt of my perspiration.  It washed up a treat on a 40 degree wash, and luckily the sun remained out long enough for it to dry outside on the washing line. However, almost immediately, it was packed up and taken to the depot where they were collecting the quilts for the show.  I was missing it already.
Further information about the Inspiration Behind the Butterfly Quilt can be seen in earlier posts.

Tuesday 13 November 2012

#1 Butterfly Quilt - Inspiration Behind the Quilt


Butterfly Scrap Quilt Fabadashery
Butterfly Quilt by Frances Meredith
Inspiration
The inspiration for this scrap quilt came from a picture in a quilting book I took out of our local library, early in my quilting journey, about 2003.  The original picture in the book was no more than a couple of inches big, but it was enough for me to work out a pattern for a block.  I like a scrappy quilt, and this quilt used all sorts of fabrics.  At the time, the only patchworking I knew was English piecing, so I made my own paper pattern, cut out all the pieces, and off I went.

History of the Butterflies Quilt
During the period when I was making the quilt, I went to a JOAnn’s store, during a trip to America, where I saw a pattern of the same quilt being sold on the shelves. I guess it was only then that I realised that the quilt I was making already had a history.  Further research when I returned home to the UK revealed that a pattern, and the history of the quilt was published in a book “The New England Quilt Museum Quilts: Featuring the Story of the Mill Girls -Instructions for 5 Heirloom Quilts” by Jennifer Gilbert (Paperback,1999) [NB: Which I notice you can currently access via Google Books].  I discovered that it was originally made in about 1935, by a lady called Nina Shrock, Harvard County, Indiana, USA, using a design by Laura Wheeler. When we were back in America in the Autumn of 2007, we made a pilgrimage to the New England Quilt Museum, in Lowell, where we able to see the quilt on display, the one I had seen originally in my library book, back in the UK.  It was a nice feeling. I now have a pencil with the same butterflies on it, as a memento!

What fabrics did I use?
My creative journey has included dressmaking and embroidery, and it was only in about 2002 that I inherited a collection of beautiful quilting fabric and I considered doing some quilting. Amongst the collection were packets of fabrics, which I later learnt were called Charm Packs.  There were 5” squares, 4“ squares, and tiny 1.5” squares, mainly from a mail order company, Strawberry Fayre based in Chagford in Devon, UK.  I wanted a project that was going to use these up, and the scrappy nature of the quilt, seemed like the ideal choice. 
However, I did notice in the small picture that there were ‘constants’.  For instance, the body of the butterfly was the same for each.  I did not have anything suitable, so I went to my local quilting and patchwork shop, BusyBees, based in the Craft Units at Tredegar House in Newport, Wales.  There I found a brown batik fabric.  I was recommended to give it a wash before I used it. I think that was a good idea.  Otherwise, I didn’t wash any of the fabric – the bits were too small.

There is a whole mix in there.  Ironically, it was only after I had completed the quilt that it was brought to my attention that there were a lot of 30’s reproduction fabrics in it.  This was not intentional, it was serendipity at work.  At the time I didn’t realise what 30’s reproduction fabrics were.  I also have one or two bits of special fabric in there, including the first piece of fabric I ever bought, at the Marldon Apple Pie Fair in Devon, back in the early 1980’s.  You can see details of Techniques and Construction in this post.

Statistics
Dimensions: 243cm x 243cm (approx 8ft x 8ft)
Blocks: 64 blocks, 10” x 10”
Piecing Method: English Paper Piecing. Hand Pieced
Quilting Method: Hand Quilted
Dates: 2004 – August 2006


Awards:
2007 South West Quilters Award for Traditional Quilts, Quilts UK , Malvern
2007 ‘My First Bed Quilt’, Great Northern Quilt Show, Harrogate


#4 Butterfly Quilt - What did I learn from this Quilt?