Block Quilts

I have always enjoyed making quilts designed around traditional blocks from my very first quilt, "Log Cabin Downunder" which featured a range of Australiana fabrics -
to the sampler quilts which have been favoured by me as teaching projects.  I like to teach students as many techniques as possible in classes and these samplers offer a lot of scope for this approach.

Or another style of block quilt is my very popular "Westward Ho" (Australian Patchwork & Quilting Vol. 16 No 8).  This quilt uses a traditional centre block with the "54-40 or Fight" Block alternated with my own "Corral" block.

Another favourite class quilt is "Borders Abound" (Australian Patchwork & Quilting Vol. 17 No 3) which is a sampler of different border styles. When you make a quilt designed around traditional blocks it is nice to put a pieced border around it.

I always seem to have many projects on the go at once and sometimes it is quite some time before I get to finish a quilt top.  This often means that the appropriate fabric for the border is no longer available so piecing a block enables me to use a lot of fabric left from the main quilt centre and it is easier to slot in others of a similar colour and value.

Well thats all from a fairly water-logged Cairns although we did spot some blue sky today between showers.
Till next time, Frances

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pickle Dish, DWR and friends

Image
Well its been a while but I have been inspired to post after seeing my quilt "In a Pretty Pickle" on the cover of the latest "Homespun" magazine https://www.facebook.com/frances.leate with the full project instructions featured inside with a brief profile about me.  This quilt was machine pieced and quilted on my Bernina domestic machine. "In a Pretty Pickle" by Frances Leate featured in Homespun, November 2017 Issue The Double Wedding Ring quilt with its melon shapes and curved centres has inspired me to design a series of quilts in this style.  One of these designs was "Ring of Roses" which featured solid arcs rather than pieced ones with applique on the centre pieces and melons.  This quilt was published as a project in Australian Patchwork & Quilting Vol 25 No 12.  I hand pieced and hand appliqued this quilt using the fusible applique method and then quilted it on my domestic Bernina. "Ring of Roses" by Frances Leat...
Read more

Blogger's Quilt Festival

Image
  Its that time of year again when Amy over at Amy's Creative Side  is organising an online quilt festival so I thought I would add my quilt "Concerto for Mixed Peel" to the all the fun.     "Concerto for Mixed Peel" by Frances Leate This quilt is approximately 78" square and has been created using the Orange Peel block in three different sizes.  The blocks were hand appliqued using the fusible method with blanket stitch.  I chose this method of applique as I needed a very portable project at the time and this proved to be just the thing.  I  quilted "Concerto for Mixed Peel" on my Bernina 440 machine in a simple style and then added the scalloped edging.  It was commissioned by Australian Homespun magazine and the brief was for a quilt using the orange peel block, thirties style fabrics and to be bright and fresh in colour.  The project was published in Homespun No. 105 Vol 13 No 2.     Till next t...
Read more

Quilt Patterns on Cosy Project

Image
I am delighted to see two of my quilt designs now up on Cosy Project where a pattern can be purchased and downloaded.  First up is the quilt I named "Concerto for Mixed Peel" because the peel block is in three sections with the blocks differing in size.   Find out more here:  https://www.cosyproject.com/mixed-peel-quilt "Concerto for Mixed Peel" by Frances Leate Another project on this site is my quilt design "Mary Mary Quite Contrary" which uses a background fabric, a contrast one (I used a fuchsia colour) and approximately 20 fat quarters of various florals.  The name for this quilt was chosen because of the predominant use of the "Contrary Wife" block and also the fact that the given name for both my husband and my own mother was Mary although contrarily neither was known by this name.   See more here:   https://www.cosyproject.com/mary-mary-quite-contrary "Mary Mary Quite Contrary" by Frances Leate The Cosy P...
Read more