Wave Quilt

I finished this quilt today in a burst of energy and just HAD to take photos behind the botany building at Melbourne Uni right away. So after picking him up from kinder, we rugged Casper up and he ate pasta from tupperware as he sat in his pram, legs too long and his face orange with tomato sauce, wiping his messy hands on his jacket. The thing is, usually I will work on something this big over a few days, but this has been weeks in the making and I was eager to have it finished and photographed. Poor Casper, poor Steve... they live in constant fear that I will drag them out on an impromptu photo shoot. We live right near Melbourne Uni, and I think the campus is especially pretty in Autumn so I knew we would go to the secret garden there.

So anyway, for the past few weeks I have been slowly making improvised curved patchwork with this fabric, the intention being that it would all come together as a quilt eventually. The patterned fabric is a poly-cotton Ken Done quilt cover that was stained in parts so I cut out the good bits and still have a fair amount left. The pink is a cotton shot with white that has this beautiful duality to it. That seems like an obvious analogy of a shot cotton, but I think that pink as a colour has the ability to be translucent jelly or pastel calamine lotion depending on the light. So I hope you understand my description. 

I learned how to make an improvised curve from this tutorial and have been thinking about the possibilities ever since. I really enjoyed the spontaneity of composing a quilt top with this technique, every time I put the pieces out on the floor of my studio I was delighted and surprised. The curved edge was a spur of the moment decision and I think it really adds to the form of the patchwork. I will be experimenting with irregular quilt shapes from now on I reckon. The batting I used is my regular 100% cotton, and I went with straight stitch machine quilting with the most incredible ballerina-satin-ribbon-pink cotton thread that I got from an op shop recently. Now I'm excited for what I can do next with my new found skill. You should try it too, the link's right up there, go on, try it!