Too much busy fabric? (Part one)

I love my fabric choice but I don’t have any idea of how to quilt the quilt!

Today I’m starting a blog series about one of my most asked questions… “how to quilt a quilt with busy fabric?”

Of course you can always go with horizontal or vertical lines each 1/2” or 1” apart, or use some “neutral” edge to edge quilting design… but would you?

Image: Kaffe Fassett bundle from my own fabric stash

First of all there is no such a thing like a “rule” about how to proceed in a situation like this. And I’m really a believer that in quilting you should do whatever you want, let your imagination fly, try something different every time and enjoy the process of learning something new and expanding your comfort zone!

For this blog series I will be using one of my show quilts, “Papaver Somniferum” as model, and showcasing all the hidden details of this super busy project.

Embrace the busy designs and take advantage of them! Remember that they are there for a very strong reason: you chose them!

“Should I use a neutral thread or coordinate all the different shades?”

Not necessarily.

If your idea is really highlighting your quilting you don’t want neutral threads, you don’t want to coordinate exactly the thread shades, actually you can even go with metallic, variegated or even decorative threads.

So, time to get to work! Let’s start with our first design!

Who doesn’t love feathers? Maybe some of us don’t like to quilt feathers, because well… it’s not the easiest quilting design. But in this case, the feathers are already there, all marked already and you just need to choose your thread color and go around them!

In this case I was using a gold tone thread contrasting with the really dark blue from the fabric background, the quilting it just following the fabric design.

I know that your next question is: “do you have a video?”

The answer is no and YES! I made this quilt in 2017, and at that time I didn’t have the habit of recording all my quilting adventures, BUT I did a simulation with my IpadPro and Procreate of how I would approach this quilting design on my machine, just click the video below ;)

The cool thing about using the fabric design motive to practice your quilting is that you will also be adding a new quilt design to your background, and it can be used in other situations in the future!

Just click the image on the side to download a version.

See you tomorrow, with the “Too much busy fabric? (part two)”

Carolina