When Island Batik posted the theme of “vintage reimagined” for March
I was thinking crazy quilting!
Here’s a bit of history about crazy quilting from wikipedia
Crazy quilts became popular in the late 1800s, likely due to the English embroidery and Japanese art that was displayed at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition. American audiences were drawn to the satin stitches used in English embroidery, which created a painterly surface, which is reflected in many Crazy Quilts. The displays shown at the Japanese pavilion of silk-screened work and Japanese pottery with a cracked-glaze inspired the American audiences. Similar aesthetics began to show up in Crazy Quilts, including unique patterns, and stitching that resembled spider webs and fans.[2]
Crazy quilting rapidly became a national fashion amongst urban, upper-class women, who used the wide variety of fabrics that the newly industrialized 19th century textile industry offered to piece together single quilts from hundreds of different fabrics. Long after the style had fallen out of fashion amongst urban women, it continued in rural areas and small towns, whose quilters adopted the patterns of the urban quilts but employed sturdier, more practical fabrics, and dropped the earlier quilts’ ornate embroidery and embellishment.[3]
Last year I made a Christmas machine embroidered crazy quilt and it was SO much fun!!
The file was from Mollymine.com
So this time I went back and bought a more “generic” quilt set.
I bought the completed series #2
(of course the week after I bought it, the price went down and she only honored the price for 48hrs)
It’s really an adorable set!
but NOW they have a sale!!
I actually started this in January! I can’t remember if I already got the Island Batik 2019 box or not, either way I picked a pile of fabrics (mostly large scraps) of blenders that were sort of marbled in a way, Sonja called it Tie dye…. These were all in mostly pastels, I kept a few darker fabrics on the side just in case I’d run out.
I bought the 8” hoop sized blocks and here’s the first block stitched out
and more blocks!
I tried to keep just 12 thread colors, my machine can stitch with 6 at a time, but there was still a lot of thread changes and each block took about an hour to stitch out!
and now I worked into February!
Between being mom taxi and family stuff I usually did one block per day, sometimes 2, then finally I had all 20 done!
I trimmed them all down to 7 3/4” I think
Then sewed them together
then I added a skinny dark blue border and a wild tie dye outer border and the top was now 37” x 44”
(and not many scraps leftover so it worked out perfectly!)
And here it is all quilted and bound!
For batting I used “Thermore” by Hobbs, it’s super thin and this way the quilt hangs really well!
I ended up doing minimal quilting on the quilt itself, I did straight lines about 1/4” from the seams in a pastel variegated thread
then some simple meandering on the outer border and to match the crazy quilt theme I did a decorative stitch on the binding!
I then hung it up in the girl’s room, Sonja really likes it there!
It was such a fun process and I’d do it again!
If you have an embroidery machine, try out mollymine (just wait for a sale!) and with the batiks from island batik it just looks awesome!
BTW I already have April’s project done! ha ha
Oh wow, this is the real artist Bea. So beautiful and colourful. I love it.
WOW that is simply amazing! What 6 needle do you own please?
Very nice. I can see why Sonja likes it.
It is really beautiful Bea.
Just fabulous!!! Sometimes we think embroidery machines are faster, they are in some things and yes, if you were to do that by hand it would take you longer but it still consumes a lot of time…but fun!
Very pretty. The batik fabrics are a fun new way to crazy quilt for sure. Love the designs.
Beautiful quilt Bea and I love the way you embroidered all of the crazy quilt blocks!
Like all the little designs.
Oh – it looks fantastic!!! You make me want to order the embroidery pattern!Happy Quilting! :-)quiltinggail@yahoo.ca
That's beautiful.
You did a beautiful job on this quilt. You should be very proud.
Very nice!
Nice crazy quilt.
شركة المثالية للتنظيف بالجبيل شركة المثالية للتنظيف بالقطيف
شركة تسليك مجاري بالجبيل شركة كشف تسربات المياه بالجبيل شركة شفط بيارات بالجبيل شركة نقل عفش بالجبيل
This is beautiful. I love how the colors all play well together and such great stiches all over!
OMG Bea, that is adorable!!
This is beautiful!!!! I love the flowers and of course the batiks are a fabulous background. Such fun, and so great for spring!!
What a creative project. April's done as well? Wow.