Orla Kiely Inpsired Quilt

I bought this purse a few months ago and I love the pattern on it. It is by a British designer named Orla Kiely. From the start I felt like this could be a quilt pattern......

I also love this quilt by John Q Adams, (I too wonder if his name is John Quincy.....) I think his is paper pieced and I did not want to do that.

Last week Victoria Gertenbach from The Silly Boo Dilly did a workshop and lecture at Calico Cutters. She talked about shot cottons and why she liked them. I have to say I was smitten! This is yet another reason to join a guild if you haven't already, the inspiration in endless!

For those of you that may not know, a shot cotton is fabric made with 2 different colors. The warp and the weft are each different giving you a very rich looking fabric with a lot of depth. As you can see above a turquoise and a black were used here.

So I took all those ideas and things I showed you and started a quilt. I am calling it Sprouts on this snowy, wintery day. Victoria encouraged everyone to grab their scissors and fearlessly cut without rulers and see what happens. I have never been afraid to do that and loved seeing how these fabrics came to life.
I even cut the stems with scissors, you would be surprised how easy it is to cut things pretty close to the same width. I am not changing them and they will be "off" a little bit but I am ok with how it will look, in fact I like it even more.

The colors are washed out from the glare of the snow but in real life the colors are nice and rich. I even have purple in there, my least favorite color!
So that is what is on  my design wall today. It's snowing again but you don't need to see a picture of that 😆

Kelly