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Quick Quilt Tops 2022: win our finished quilt
After presenting 10 different quilt layouts using a one-round Log Cabin block in our latest Quick Quilt Top Series, readers chose this one as their favorite:
Next, we selected three different quilting designs for that layout, and once again we asked you to vote for the one you liked best. Almost 2,800 votes were cast, and we were surprised to find out only 11 votes separated the winner from the second-place finisher. Here’s how the votes stacked up:
Design 1 – WINNER
Design 3 – second place
Design 2 – third place
We used three bright batiks from the Summer Garden collection by Jacqueline de Jonge for Anthology to piece the quilt using the winning layout. Then we quilted it with Design 1, which uses the Butter-Fly panto by Anne Bright Designs.
From a distance, the butterflies seem to be hiding among the flowers, but we promise they are there, as you can see in this gorgeous detailed photo!
Now for the best part—as promised, someone gets to win this quilt, along with some great goodies from APQS! To win this lap quilt, please comment on this Facebook post or this Instagram post by noon Central Time on Friday, April 1 and we will pick a winner at random and inform them via a Facebook or Instagram direct message. Good luck!
There are so many combinations of fabric, thread and quilting motifs to make a quilt. Truly there is no wrong way, just different ways! It was a fun process to have you all involved in completing this project.
We see finished quilts and quilting patterns all the time and it’s amazing every time to evaluate what combinations we put together and what we like or don’t like about what we did. I see it as an opportunity to learn and know how to change things on the next quilt for different results.
I always suggest customers think about the end use of their project before we make decisions on how their project will be quilted. Are we giving this quilt to the third cousin of my neighbor’s nephew’s aunt or are we working on a bed-size quilt that I’m going to walk by multiple times a day and sleep under each night? Depending on the answer to how this quilt is going to be used and who might be receiving it, could help you decide between a simple and minimal meander or a more complicated quilting design that takes me longer to execute, but it will be worth it to enjoy seeing it every day.
Before I finalize the quilting design, I consider the fabrics in the quilt top and the thread color I’ll use for the quilting stitches. Let’s start with the quilting thread. Do you want the thread to stand out or blend into the fabrics? And, when you look at the fabrics of the quilt, what will happen to the thread once it’s quilted. Will you be able to see the thread color or even the quilting motif?
Let’s discuss some examples. If my quilt top is a solid color, we know immediately that every quilting motif is going to pop off the quilt top, even if the color of the thread matches the color of the fabric. I would want the quilting motif to be outstanding because it’s definitely going to be seen. This is the perfect place for custom quilting or an edge-to-edge motif that has lots of detail.
If my quilt top has high contrast (for example, black and white), I won’t find a color of thread that blends with everything, so I need to decide where I want to have the thread shown. Do I choose a white thread, so it blends in with the white fabric and sticks out on the black? Or the reverse of that. Or do I select a gray and it shows equally on both the black and the white fabrics?
What if my quilt top is super busy? Will any color show? Or any motif show? It’s a real possibility that you’ll simply end up seeing texture on the quilt top but not being able to distinguish the actual motif that was quilted. Our quilt shown here is a good example, where the thread blends across all of the colors in the quilt, and the fabrics are just busy enough to hide or distract your eye from seeing the butterfly motifs from a distance. Up close and personal and you can see the design just fine.
What combination of quilting design, fabric and thread will you select for your next project?
Now for the best part—as promised, someone gets to win this quilt, along with some great goodies from APQS! To win this lap quilt, please comment on this Facebook post or this Instagram post by noon Central Time on Friday, April 1 and we will pick a winner at random and inform them via a Facebook or Instagram direct message. Good luck!
