Finally DONE

This is a sort-of commissioned work I did for my sister. I wanted to make her a quilt and asked her to pick out colours and style, I wanted to make sure she really likes her quilt.

So, she asked for a charcoal and white chevron quilt. I ordered Kona cotton for this project and was very pleased with the feel and look of it. But beware, thinking “chevron quilt” I think “half-square triangles” so nice and happy I started cutting squares at 8 cm per side. Half way through the cutting I realized, that using half-square triangles would only be necessary for a scrappy chevron quilt. The two coloured version could have been done sooooo easily by cutting stripes and sewing blocks. Aaaaah, well, too much fabric already cut so I had to bite my teeth and continue the way I started.

I didn’t count the squares but they were PLENTY. I cut 9 yards of each colour into 8 cm square, so how much makes that?

Sewing was surprisingly nice and relaxing and the quilt top went together fairly fast, only being disrupted by a half year break due to work reasons.

First I decided to use a polybatting to work help with the weight of the fabric and doing some simple meandering to get the quilting part quickly over. I got talked over by the lady of our local quilt shop and simultaneously being a patchwork teacher to do a zig zag echoing the chevron pattern. Well, that resulted into a lot of threat breaking and frustration. Finally I figured I cant push this huge quilt around in zig zags, so there I picked out all the quilting and tried meandering. I managed to do over half of the quilt when I realized I didn’t like the look, also the poly had a too high loft, making it very difficult to freemotion on it. The meander took too much away from the graphic look of the quilt. Seam ripper how much time we spent together…

Next I figured I need a thinner batting, so the zig zagging might work after all… back to the LQS and I bought some thinner cotton batting. I freemotion quilted the zig zag echoing the chevron approximately 1.5-2 cm inside the seam. The plastic freemotion food was my guide and it worked quite nicely. Lots of repetitive sewing time, but this is something I enjoy and meditate to. I am pleased with the results and can’t wait to give it to my sister.

 This quilt is huge, measuring 2.6 x 2.8 m.


Update: Here is a picture of the quilt "in action". It fits nicely :-)