Tuesday 11 October 2016

Fly Up, Fly Down

I've got an un-seasonal finish to share with you today. A wall quilt about 30'' squared called "Fly up, fly down".

butterflies quilt

If anybody visits this blog regularly, they would know that curve piecing has been my big obsession for quite a long time now. I find that curves add a lot of interest to the predominantly straight-line genre of quilting. My previous curve-pieced quilts are more like "pictures", images that are their own thing. What I wanted to do in this case was to design a really simple curve-pieced block, which could work on its own as well as in combination with any traditional or modern blocks.

butterflies quilt

The butterfly block consists of two squares, so it can work in a grid, and and each square is made of six parts with curved seams, the curves being very gentle and much easier to sew than the traditional drunkard's path block, for example.

I wanted to make a couple of blocks to try it out and couldn't stop until I had 8! In this case the idea was co combine curve piecing technique with the modern quilt aesthetic, so I chose blenders and a neutral background (it would be more modern to use solids, but I just don't have any :))) Then I played with the layout options:

butterflies quilt

Decided on the last one.

I chose to quilt the butterflies with a custom wing pattern and the background with irregularly spaced vertical lines. I made a freezer paper "mask" to mark the butterflies:

butterflies quilt

The butterflies were quilted with variegated threads in shades of purple and yellow/brown correspondingly, and I like how different fragments of the thread show on different butterflies.

butterflies quilt

I like how this quilt turned out, although it's very different from what I've done before (sometimes I feel like I can say that about almost every one of my quilts - I really love experimenting). I hope it has that "modern" feel about it.

butterflies quilt

While working with this block I had so many ideas about other uses for it - for one thing it would be great to showcase some beautiful prints or hand-dyed fabrics, for another, I'd like to combine it with other blocks, then I though about enlarging it and "cutting" it with more curved seams to create various wing designs...

I'm wondering if anyone would like to try out this block. I could make it a free pdf download if somebody is interested.

Linking up to Linky Tuesday at Freemotion by the River
Fabric Tuesday at Quilt Story
Let's Bee Social at Sew Fresh Quilts
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8 comments:

  1. Your butterflies are beautiful. Even though they are of one solid piece of fabric, your quilting is what give them beauty, in my opinion. I like the name you gave to this piece, too. :-)

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  2. Those butterflies are so pretty! I have not done curved piecing before, but I might be willing to try if you end up making the pattern. It would be a nice block to practice the curved piecing and free motion quilting too.

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  3. I love your Butterfly Quilt! My favorite colors too!

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  4. I would love to make this quilt . I would make it in solids to see how it turns out. It's great!

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  5. Oh wow. This is fantastic! So simple and beautiful!!

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  6. Your butterflies are great, and I love the way you quilted them! I am working a lot with curved piecing at the moment (when I am not trying to finish some old projects), so I'd love to try out your pattern...

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  7. They are beautiful! I don't have time right now, but would your pdf!

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  8. I have been an admirer of your curve piecing for a while now. The butterflies are beautiful and the quilting looks amazing! Love that you didn't quilt the vertical lines over the butterflies, enhances them so much more!

    -Soma

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