Contemporary Quilt Group - Monoprinting.

At the January meeting of our Contemporary Quilt Group the technique we experimented with was monoprinting.

Now, I had bad memories of this technique from City & Guilds - mainly because I always seemed to end up with dull, drab samples that didn't inspire me.

This time I was determined to put a more modern twist on the technique.

 This is the very small quilt I made from one of my samples - it is about 6 inches square.

 Here are my samples on the design wall - I used Valentine's Day as a theme.

I am quite looking forward to making these up into a quilt or two. I am still in the planning stages.
I actually enjoyed monoprinting this time round!

Contemporary Quilt Group - Using Markal Paintsticks

At our Contemporary Quilt group meeting in November we experimented with Markal Paintsticks, Inktense Pencils, wax crayons and ways of colouring fabric.

I was lucky enough to have Lesley on my table who was very generous with her Markal sticks, stencils and rubbing mats and I was able to make lots of samples.

Well, as we all know samples are not much good unless they are made up into quilts so this is the little quilt I made from some of my samples which is destined to become an AAQI donated quilt.  

 It is 12 x 9 inches and is made from recycled white cotton which has been coloured using a rubbing plate and Markal sticks (Thanks Lesley!)

 I cut up the coloured areas and added white areas to break it up.
It was then sandwiched into a little quilt.
Then I machine quilted it, following the design into the white areas.

The pink dots in the white areas are fabric paint.

  This second piece is also coloured with Markal Sticks using a stencil on top. When the stencil is removed it leaves the white areas which I have decided to embellish with hand embroidery which is very slow but enjoyable to do.

In January our topic was monoprinting and I will share my samples from that workshop soon.
Our next meeting is this Saturday and I am teaching a workshop on Liberated Piecing - really looking forward to it. Come join us if you are free on Saturday!

City & Guilds completed and a new Quilt Group - all in the same day!

Saturday 24th September 2011 was a big day for me! I finally completed FOUR years of City & Guilds studies. I have now completed my 7113 in Creative Textiles which goes with my certificate in Patchwork & Quilting and award in Machine Embroidery.

Anyone who cares to scroll further down this blog will see it is a very long time since I posted.

The reason for this is that this time last year I was on the verge of giving up. I had had a very difficult journey with my Machine Embroidery which led to a severe blow to my confidence which made me question my ability to complete the course.

But I am not a quitter and even though I needed to complete three units in the last 9 months I decided to stick with it and try to overcome some of my issues.

And I have overcome them - I have produced some work I am proud of both from the design and the quilting perspective.

So what about this blog? I was thinking of deleting it but have decided against this. The reasons for this decision are these. Firstly I still have 14 followers, now I know some of you are my quilting buddies but the rest of you have obviously hung on in there just in case I started posting again. Secondly I have noticed that I am still getting visitors who may find some of my experiences useful in their own C&G journey. Thirdly I have decided to try and keep doing a small amount of more experimental textile art and this blog would be a great place to share it.

So that brings me on to the second important event of Saturday 24th September - I joined a new Contemporary Quilt Group. It is affliated with Region 14 of the Quilters Guild and is hoping to meet monthly in Clifford, near Wetherby, North Yorkshire.

I have joined with my friend Hazel and the first nice surprise was finding that another quilting friend, Davina had decided to come.
We had a lovely day, organised by Sandra and Penny and it was lovely to do design exercises (arty farty stuff!) with no strings attached! Just knowing that now you can do this for pleasure, work on it some more or just chuck it in the bin was so liberating!

First we started with a collage!! One of my most loathed art forms in City & Guilds!
But not this time - I just got on with it and had one put together in about 5 minutes!
And here is a photo to prove it.

Then we had to take one of the images (I chose the caterpillars in the top right) and draw some lines to represent what we saw. We then cut this drawing into strips and reassembled them to make a new design. Now I know this is pretty basic design stuff but I just got on and did it - no messing. Here is a photo of the result.

I wonder if I will take this design any further - or just throw it in the bin?

Image Transfer Sample.

Although I have shown this on my other blog I need to have it here as it is part of my machine embroidery C&G collection. The image is of course my son's photo, taken of the motorway near Barnsley.
I printed the image onto lightweight vilene in black and white.
We were told to incorporate pintucks into the piece using the twin needle on our machines. I did thid using a red and orange thread to represent the lights from the cars.
I then used a silver metallic thread to machine quilt other areas such as the motorway sign and bridge.
I then added black borders and bindings.

This was a very difficult piece to photograph but hopefully you get the idea,

Shadow Applique Sugar Bowls.

Here is another of my samples from November - on the image transfer theme.
The photos of the sugar bowls were transferred onto lightweight vilene and cut out carefully. They were then bondawebbed onto squares of hand dyed fabric. I have used pink and purple squares. The squares were joined into a four patch and then covered with a red net with sequins. I quilted around each sugar bowl.


Although this is a simple technique I love the quirky design - it always makes me smile when I look at it! I think using the images for shadow applique works really well as it softens the look and feel of the vilene.

Image transfer applique

Here is another sample from my machine embroidery collection. It uses image transfer techniques combined with applique.

I started with a star which had been transferred onto fabric using transfer crayons.

I appliqued it onto some green fabric using straight stitched raw edge applique in a variegated thread. I cut away most of the green fabric and then appliqued it onto the yellow fabric using gold metallic thread. All the fabrics in this sample are hand dyed.

I then added pale green borders. The yellow square was free motion quilted and the border was quilted with star motifs in the variegated thread.

I am quite pleased with the result - it is more free than my usual samples and I like the way the design has been built up out of several layers.

Paper weaving.

The other set of artwork we did in November was paper weaving which I feel has thrown up some great ideas for quilts - particularly optical illusion quilts.
This first sample was weaving inside a shape which was based on one of the shapes from my 1960s plates. I really like the almost 3D effect that you get.

This one is weaving using curved pieces, the black strips are curvy and the coloured strips are straight.

This one is weaving a photo with plain strips.

This one is done using strips of varying widths.

I think that there are lots more ways that I could explore possible quilt designs using weaving as a basis. I have actually got a book on woven quilts coming from Santa and will be making some samples when I have had a good chance to study it.