Planning a Big Quilt Project

There’s something about reaching the middle of the year that makes quilters itch to start a fresh, ambitious project – especially one that helps chip away at the stash. A sampler quilt with many blocks is a perfect choice. Not only does it offer a fun challenge, but all those blocks mean you get to use a wide variety of fabrics. Of course, with that variety comes the tricky part: choosing which fabrics to use and how to pull it all together.

There are many great sampler quilts out there like Angie Wilson’s Kinship, Tula Pink’s City Sampler, or Jen Kingwell’s designs. Personally, I’m smitten by Harriet’s Journey by Jennifer Chiaverini – a 100 block quilt.

Look on Insta and Pinterest for other versions of a specific pattern to give you some ideas of howelse you can use classic patterns. You may find a colour scheme that really works for you, oralternate layouts of a pattern. Remember that you don’t have to make ALL the blocks. It’s quitefine to size down your quilt and make fewer blocks. Or make it as big but use loads of negativespace and float fewer blocks on the quilt top. Look up ‘modern traditional’ quilts to see ideas foralternative layouts that give traditional blocks a modern spin.

The design you choose will determine what fabrics you use.

(Rayne Quilt by Leanne Harvey from Make Modern Issue 46.)

You might go for rainbow, or a more subdued palettesuch as blues or greens. Neutrals (black, white and grey) work fabulously together. Once you choose a colour scheme, pull fabrics from your stash in those colours. If you have room on yourwork table, I recommend doing a big fabric pull for a sampler, then as you work through eachblock, just use whatever takes your fancy at the time. You can plan it out first, but this can be verytime consuming – often it’s easier to just piece whatever you feel like it. When you lay out the finalquilt top, there is absolutely no rule that says you have to put the blocks in the exact same spotas in the original pattern, so you can mix them around a bit to balance it out.

Sometimes, a unifying fabric or theme can help pull together a bigproject. It’s a great way to use a lot of fabrics from one designer, these usually play well together even if they’re from different collections. When I made my version of Kinship last year, I decided I wanted a black, white and grey colour scheme with a hint of rainbow. I chose ten fabrics in a rainbow gradient from the Pick Up Sticks collection by Kim Schaefer for Andover, which unified my entire design, then the rest ofthe fabrics were straight from the stash. Sometimes a fat quarter bundle won’t be enough for a whole quilt, but it’s a great starting pointfor a fabric pull and it sets the tone for the entire quilt.

Most samplers suit small to medium scale prints. Add fussy cuts for personality, and be sure to balance light and dark fabrics for contrast.

You may need to buy background, border, or binding fabric – try to buy all at once to ensure the same dye lot.

(Twirly Quilt by Staci Wendland from Make Modern Issue 62.)

This is an extract from Planning a Big Project by Jane Kelly. Read the full article in Make Modern Issue #38.

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