Ghost of Quilts past present and future

We watch a lot of Muppet's Christmas Carol around here.

I’m really excited to be designing quilts again, and with new fabric! If you haven’t read about the new fabric collection, read here and here.

Also! If you haven’t listened to the Fussy Cutters Club podcast all about the new stuff, it’s very fun and worth a listen. You can follow this link, or you can listen wherever you listen to podcasts.

AND! In case you missed it, there’s a post up on the Moda blog all about my design practices. You can read that here.

There’s lots to read about. It really all orbits the same solar system, but the different perspectives are fun, in my opinion.

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Let’s get into the good stuff.

I’d like to start by saying I’ve discovered, from years of work and looking back, that I have a real quilt style and philosophy. I call it Tear and Share quilting.

The philosophy is based on antique quilts that had a tremendous number of fabrics in them. There were so many different prints, and they were typically really small pieces. In the depression or really lean times, how would someone have had so many different fabrics? The answer is two fold. Saving scraps from every piece of cloth you come across and, sharing. You would have cut a wedge or so from your sister’s fabric scraps, or your mother’s, or your great aunt, or you neighbor’s, or church’s quilt group. You would have been doing the same for them.

There’s a richness to this.

It’s easy now that we all have so much of the same fabric, and big stashes/collections to not need to share, but I have found, through my workshops, that some of the most interesting and successful blocks came when the group started passing around pieces to share. It’s like cake, and I love cake.

The Ice Cream Cone Mystery quilt is a really good example of this.

This can’t always play out. You aren’t always making quilts in a group, and the postal service currently has a few more issues than normal. That’s why creating collection quilts that run the gamut of a designers work, or a color story that you love to encapsulate a full collection is also something I do a lot of.

I play a lot with color groupings in my quilts. This is something that I feel like makes one of my quilts recognizable. It allows you to use a fair amount of one color together. This is a trick I’ve developed for making quilts that work with a single fabric collection.

The Meadow is a perfect example of my devotion to color groups. It also makes a great Tear and Share.

My designing also comes from a place of, “will this look good on a bed”. Obviously not all quilts will go on beds, but I have found that some quilts really don’t work for me on beds. And I like this as a reference point.

And then some quilts are just good looking quilts, and I like that just as much as the next person. In these quilts, I tend to take traditional blocks and alter them in size and coloring. This is just fun, and we like to do fun things. Don’t we?!

So to recap: My quilts are based around sharing, color groups, and innovating around traditional blocks. I feel good about this.

ghosts of quilts past

These Ghosts of Quilts Past:

• The Ice Cream Cone Mystery Quilt (will receive an updated name)

• The Diamond and Sphere Mystery Quilt (will also receive and updated name)

• The Meadow quilt

Will all be receiving patterns, and hard templates this year and next. They’ll each come out a few months apart, with the ice cream cone before the end of this year, and the Meadow and other Mystery Quilt after the beginning of the new year. Maybe something like… I don’t know… Quiltcon???

We’ll talk more about the Meadow in another post.

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Ghost of Quilts Present:

With the release of Love Letter, I have 4 new quilts that will be released in a few months. I’m actually pretty excited about all of them, but I’m really chuffed about Bright Future.

It has a self curving edge! How cool is that?!

Also, depending on which way you turn it, this quilt will play tricks on you.

It follows my color grouping principles and It’s just a stunner. Moda is releasing a kit, and if you’re a shop buying the kits, they’re offering a digital quilt which is so cool, and also I had to digitally fussy cut every. single. piece. 328 pieces. When I tell you, I’d rather cut fabric for 24 hours solid with a rotary blade that needs to be replaced, I mean it. It was incredibly tedious, but I hope the pay off is big for shops.

The construction of this quilt is really cool, and based on a block that I’ve spent a lot of time with.

While I absolutely want you to make a Love Letter version of this, when I tell you that a rainbow solid version of this is basically the most mesmerizing thing you’ve ever seen, I mean it… all that’s to say, is that I think this quilt has legs.

Also! I’m working on hard templates that will be sold separately. If you want to stick to the paper ones included, all power to you. I just taught too many classes with people cutting through their patterns all willy nilly to believe you want to deal with that. You don’t, and I don’t want the emails asking for new ones.

The next quilt that I’m just over the moon for is Special Delivery

This quilt lands squarely in all most of my favorite categories. Color groups, innovating with traditional blocks, AND looks ridiculously good looking on a bed. This is one that I’ll show you several color variations and how you can change the block in the pattern. It can look wildly different depending on where you place values. It’s such a great quilt.

The next is Napping House

This is a classic design that you can max out or keep it pretty chill. I’ve used a single color way from Love Letter and a solid. It’s kind of calling out to be hand quilted. OR you could have it quilted with neon for something unique.

Wouldn’t this be incredible with super dark indigo background, glowing stars, and a color progression of 9 patches? I’m excited about this. Don’t sleep on the Napping House, or do, but literally.

The last, but might change your life, is Rockhound.

The digital cover will never do it justice. This quilt is so cool, and so clever it’ll shock you. I’m still making this quilt (it has a few pieces). This is the sparkliest, coolest quilt. When the 4 color groups meet up, it basically will put you in a trance.

Love Letter is perfect for this quilt. Makes the fabrics look repro, but in a super fresh way. Also would look perfect on a bed after you’ve line dried it outside.

I’m trying to work out templates for this one too, because it’s kind of a pain in the neck cutting without them. I’ll keep you posted.

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Something I’m really excited about for all of the patterns is the format. Each of the new patterns will be 8x10. And they include probably more charts and guides than you’ve ever seen on a pattern.

When I was teaching classes, no matter what quilt we were doing, I kept creating new charts to answer more questions in my classes, and they just created more ease for all sewing levels. They’ll also all have a blank quilt for you to color in or mark with your fabrics. As much as they’re patterns, they are work books, for your notes, for your swaps, and for your process.

I could have only ever done this after years and years of teaching on the road, understanding better what it is people were needing to be successful.

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Ghost of Quilts future.

I’m happy to be doing this. I’m really happy to be designing quilts again.

There might be some online teaching in my future, AND there could be some limited in person teaching too. The kind of stuff you won’t want to miss… at sea… or in the northern woods of Ontario… that sort of thing. Where we have time together, and mid day performances by Magnolia.

What’s your favorite quilt here? What are you excited to make and see more of?

xoxoxo