Color Question, where are my sunglasses?

One of the best classes I took was a scrappy quilt that had a multi-colored floral focus fabric and 18 - 20 something fabrics that went with the focus fabric. It is amazing how many colors and values, shades and hues of those colors go with it. I learned alot about color from that one class.

I'll bet your quilt isn't a garish as you may think .........can you post a photo?

Laurie G. in CA

Don't feel bad -- lots of quilters have trouble with color, especially value. And 99% of us can learn.

The color wheel is a great learning tool for some people, and for some people it only confuses things further. Most color wheels are based on paint, not fabric, so there will be some differences. (In paint, you cannot have a light red that isn't pink. In fabric, however, you CAN have a light red with no pink, because fabric isn't a solid color, so you can have just little bits of red on a light background.) You can find color wheels online or at your library, so there's no need to buy one until you decide it's something you'll use all the time.

I got a great tip from a guild speaker one time (I really wish I could remember who it was!), and it's worked fabulously for me. Take a print from your stash that you like. Then grab every fabric in your stash that remotely reminds you of that print. Don't spend time thinking -- just grab. Spread them out so you see a few inches of each one; the misfits will jump out at you, and can be removed. When you're done, you'll have a pleasing palette.(You don't have to use the initial fabric in your final quilt. It was just there to give you a starting point)

Value is something I've struggled with a lot, and from quilts I've seen, other quilters have struggled, too. IM(NS)HO, a lot of problems people blame on color are really value and placement issues. Our brains like to see contrast (which is something value does well), because we are hardwired to look for contrast. And our aesthetic side likes a smooth movement around the quilt, which is where placement comes in. A design wall where you can step back several feet has really helped me with this.

HTH!

Here#s a cheater trick: find a print fabric you really love, one of the super expensive ones with lots of colors. Along one selvedge will be a row of colored dots, one for every color used in the fabric. You don't have to buy this expensive print or use it in the quilt (unless you just can't bear not to), but use it to select a combination of similar colors.

Then lay out all the fabrics and look at them through a piece of red plastic (ruby beholder). If lots of them are red, you might also want to use a green plastic. This lets you see values as gray tones. If there are too many the same value, try going a bit lighter or darker with some of them. Or if you have a pattern that calls for only 3-4 fabrics, pick a light, 2 mediums and a dark from your print collection and go with those.

I used to buy all sorts of cute novelties just because. (Still do now and then.) But they tend to include too many colors for the type of quilts I like nowadays. So I keep them for backings and borders, where the designs can show off, and use more tone-on-tone prints for piecing blocks.

Carol Doak has a book "Easy Stash Quilts" that's great for showing you how to combine your FQs while maintaining a color plan. Roberta in D

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Look at paintings. There are lots of artists who made bright colours work (Memling, Delacroix, Van Gogh, Picasso, Pollock, Hockney, Bacon, Rauschenberg, Mondriaan...) and others who mostly used pastel or dark, rich tones (the cave painters of southern Europe, Rembrandt, Poussin, Blake, Turner, Whistler). And people who could do either (Monet, Klee).

There's nothing at all wrong with a quilt being extremely bright if that's the effect you wanted.

There is a nice anecdote about Turner putting one of his muted swirly seascapes into an exhibition and realizing at the opening that people were having their attention drawn to a more colourful painting by a rival. So he immediately added a bright red buoy to the composition. That one little red dot was all it took to catch everybody's eye when they first came into the gallery.

We've just finished one - sorta Klee-like colours and a Mondriaan-like composition. It's nine-patches of BRIGHT mixed green-blues and orange- browns, with a central bargello panel of the same colours forming a sort of landscape, with red/orange applique flames; but it's sashed with wide bands of dead black and bordered in marbled dark grey. The bright bits fit into a design that would look funereal with anything more toned-down. It wasn't composed that way - the original impetus was Marion getting antsy about wanting to sew something, so we just pulled two piles of primary-opposite colours out of the stash, she made the nine-patches, we put them aside, then after a couple of weeks of wondering what to do with them I had the idea of the black/grey setting, then the applique came a week or two after that. I'll see if I can photograph it before we give it away - I don't have a digital camera so it'll take time.

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This is a very interesting concept, Jack. I am an art Philistine, I'm afraid, but I can appreciate the parallels you draw here. I'm going to think of this more. I *always* remain 'safe' within my own colour boundaries. Perhaps, like Turner, I should venture the tiniest, astonishing element! We'll see - I might be quite incapable of doing it - but I will consider it! Thanks very much for this piece of lateral thinking on a topic I, like Sherry and others, have difficulty with. . In message , Jack Campin - bogus address writes

See if your library has a copy of Joen Wolfrom's Color Play. Since color is so very much a matter of personal taste, I can't suggest that you buy her book if her suggestions don't appeal to you. I just ventured over to Abebooks to see if there was a used copy available and there was - but it is $17 and that's right pricey for a used book, methinks. When I'm puzzled about whether to add or subtract a color, I always enjoy seeing what Wolfrom has to say. Polly

I was right....not garish at all!!!! It is beautiful and very vintage looking. If you really don't like it, my dd would! lol! And another thing?.....it doesn't look like every other quilt made of the same pattern.....unique.....that's a good thing!

Laurie G. in CA

I think it's a glorious quilt. Not too bright at all. Debra in VA See my quilts at