Friday, October 24, 2014

If you wait long enough, I make a quilt.

Hey, I made a quilt! Didn't see that coming, did you.

I have a Room of My Own, which is a bit of a sty, littered as it is with an appalling volume of half-finished, half-begun, and ill-conceived projects. Short of flame, the only way I can think of to "clean" it -- by which I mean, open up an access path so that I can water the plants back by the window -- is to actually complete some of the projects.

This is what I might term, if I were insufferably pompous -- you make the call! -- a "process quilt." That's to say, I never sat down and planned where each individual piece of fabric would go. Rather, I made a set of rules and followed them, trusting that they would end up generating a quilt that looks more or less good.

In this case, the basic rule is that using low-grade scrap and surplus fabrics, I'm alternating thicker strips of dark with thinner strips of light.  (If you have a weirdly active memory, you might catch that I mentioned this idea a year and a half ago.  The quilt I was talking about in that post is still cluttering up the room, and thus might make progress towards actually quilthood if my momentum stays all fired up.)  Because I've been working on, and sorting out, several projects simultaneously, I don't really remember how much of this one was already put together and how much not when I uncovered it last month.  I think I did most of it in this October, though.

Although you won't credit it from the picture, I think it actually looks pretty good.



Mrs.5000 likes it too.  So, as is generally the case when she seems enthusiastic about a quilt in production, it's hers.  Like we need more blankets.  We are a house unusually rich in blankets.



The Specs

Name: none.
Serial Number: I've lost track.

Dimensions: 77" x 54"
Batting: An old blanket I found somewhere.
Backing: A low quality synthetic material that was, technically speaking, both "stretchy" and "slippery."  Because of these qualities, and because I used a simple pressure foot instead of a walking foot [just nod knowingly] there is massive pucker between all of the quilting seams on the back end.  That's usually considered an error, but in this case I'm calling it part of the design. 
Quilting: Parallel transverse straight lines.

Begun: Hard to say exactly, but maybe May of 2013.
Finished: October, 2014.

Intended Use/Display: Blanket for use.
Provenance: In the collection of Mrs.5000.

5 comments:

Rebel said...

Continuing to nod knowingly.... I actually like the way fabric gathers as you quilt it. Especially when you alternate which direction you go. Looks great - one detail I'm wondering about though, have you washed it yet? What was the shrinkage on the silky/stretchy fabric?

MDIC said...

I think it's beautiful!

mrs.5000 said...

It is lovely, and very tactile in its furrows.

Wash it?!! But it's new!

Sarah Nopp said...

Lovely! And I may just snag this idea. to use up some of the fabric in have in bits and pieces. I also understand that need to carve a path. I have recently taken over about half of my main floor lving as my weaving and sewing space. The piles were a bit disheartening in my newly claimed, and imagined organized area. First up: three year procrastination quilt.2nd will be one of the looms which has a 15 month old project on it.

Rebel said...

Mrs.5K - I wash them to increase the 'tactile furrows' which I greatly enjoy.

Also M5K - I should have known by the quilt what season it is! Go Ducks!!