Fabric for watercolor quilt

Apr 05, 2007 23 Replies

I've decided my next project will be a watercolor quilt but I am having a problem building up a decent palette to get started. A 1993 book on the subject by Pat Magaret and Donna Slusser suggest that a palette be composed of two inch pieces of fabric with a wide range of colors, contrasting values and intensities, a variety of scales, and asymmetrical lines and design. My wife has been quilting for many years and I was anxious to go through her scrap collection but discovered a problem. Most of her fabric scraps had small repeating patterns, were of color on color designs, or had a very small symmetrical pattern. There were very few pieces of large floral patterns or paisleys that seem to be best for watercolor quilts. The authors of the book suggested finding fabric by joining a mail- order fabric club.



Does anyone have experience with a mail-order fabric club?



Does anyone have other suggestions about how to accumulate a lot of small pieces of a wide range of appropriate fabric?


Jerry in North Alabama

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you ask on here! Jessamy's requirements were quite different to yours, she wanted those small patterns and tone on tones, she's built up quite a few scraps for her hexagon project, you could do the same, I think people would be particularly keen to help a male quilter!

I couldn't quite get what you mean though, are you saying the fabrics should be of a single colour? Perhaps if you could put a picture up of what you need, or find an existing link, I'm not familiar with watercolour quilts, so I'm struggling to get a feel for your needs.

Anne

found this article

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if you look at her page on strip piecing, she does use florals.

Anne

yeah! wot Anne said! and anyway joining a charm club is fun but collecting enough would take forever!

so.. which size do you want and which colours? I have loads of larger and or busier scraps and it's no hardship for me to cut 2 instead of 1 square as I dig through the scraps and the part of my stash I haven't had yet :-)

please tell us all what you need and please send me your snail mail privately (as you don't really want half the world to see your addy *here* hehehe)

Be prepared to send your address to mucho crazy quilters who would love to help you out. However, be sure to be specific in what you want so we don't send you the wrong stuff. Be prepared for a mail box full of squishies.

I don't know what you pattern is ... but I did a watercolor variation (a heart) and purchased the fabrics I needed. It used 3 fabrics: a large scale floral, a tone-on-tone solid that matched the background of the floral print and an accent color.

I cut the 2 inch squares then picked and chose the squares based upon how the florals covered the 2" (actually 2 1/2" unfinished) square to create shape of the heart.

You can see a picture of it here:

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Another idea for getting a variety of fabrics in smaller sizes... check out ebay.

Kate in MI

You can go to the Keepsake Quilting site, and they have watercolor packets. I think Connecting Threads and Hancock's of Paducah sites also have the packets. I know several members of my quilt guild have ordered the packets from Keepsake Quilting, and loved them.

Sherry Starr

Thanks for the replies. I guess I was not very clear about what I needed. So here goes: two x two inch pieces of 100% cotton each piece have a variety of colors, shapes, color intensities, values, and contrast variety of pieces to cover a wide range of colors, shapes, color intensities, values, and contrast

It seems that large floral prints when cut into the 2"x2" gives the right result. Quite often other large scale prints (animals, birds, vegetable,etc) also work. Occasionally, paislies work but most paislies do not have much color variety

I probably am violating some kind of copyright but I found some pics of the types of fabric and posted them in my webshots album.

Oops, I think the last post left off my webshots link.

Jerry in North Alabama

Something like this should help:

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I started my watercolor fabric collection by getting these types of sets, then later got fabrics individually.

-- Anita --

Jerry, go to

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for crying out loud - that's a long address - but should get you to quilter's cache at the place where you get to do a search. Type in : kit watercolor They'll show you 3 or 4 pages of what's available at many shops. You might see just what you're looking for and could save you lots of collecting and cutting time. We saw a quilt at a shop in Tennessee that was watercolor - hardly more than a flower garden with a butterfly appliqué. I'm not a big fan of kits but this was a lot of fun and easy. Polly

There are some listings on EBAY for pre-cut fabrics. When I did my one and only attempt, I also used the backs of fabrics for some light and medium tones. Linda PATCHogue, NY

Keepsake Quilting used to sell packages of 2" squares for watercolour quilts, as well as fabric strips. You might want to check them out.

Just send your address privately to everybody who asks -I'm asking! 2" squares will be on their way asap. Roberta in D

"MaleQuilter" schrieb im Newsbeitrag news: snipped-for-privacy@e65g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...

Jerry, (piggybacking here) you could always just simply ask us for what you are looking for---if'n you don't mind giving out your addy. some of us might be willing and able to give you a hand

Butterfly (remind me AFTER I'm unpacked)

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Yeeeeha!, B'fly. Wondered when you'd get hooked back up. How's it going? Polly

Right now a bit frustrating:( Fella said he would be here Wed...then Fri--well---here it is Fri and the phone rings saying his compressor died so he is on another job.....we HAVE a compressor but then he said something else. ALL that is left is the door and trim SIGH

So my guys might do the trim--they have done that kind of stuff before. Once the trim is done then we can get the shelving up...... NEED to have that done as SIL/DH are to be here this week and she will help with the unpacking---she is GOOD at it ... lots of practice... I may just stand back and let them have at it :) With the way Ginger packed it should be easy. They're staying at friends so I don't have to worry on that.

Thanks for asking Butterfly (Dreaming of the day I can START quilting again)

Howdy!

You really have to watch what you say around here, Jerry. >

Hi Jerry,

Keepsake Quilting often offers watercolor palettes. However, you might consider asking for trades on this newsgroup. When I was in need of a variety of yellows, I got all I needed for the king-sized quilt I was making. Heck, you could offer to trade a 6" square (since you don't need much of each fabric). I'd be glad to peak in my stash. :-)

Michelle in NV

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