As many of you know, I love scrap quilting. Scrap quilts allow you to use a large variety of fabrics and also put colors together that you wouldn’t otherwise. That’s the fun. However, I like to add some continuity to my scrap quilts so they are not so chaotic. That’s what I will talk about this week along with some tips how I build a stash. If you read my posts in January on color and contrast in fabrics and auditioning fabrics, you will see how all of this fits together in scrap quilting. Let’s get started!
Organizing the Chaos
A scrap quilt can look like a riot of color and very unorganized. I like to tame these quilts by adding one or two elements that calm them down a bit, for lack of a better term. There are several ways to tame these quilts so I will share the tips here.
Tip #1: Use one block design for the whole quilt. I do this in my quilt, Scrappy North Stars.
Here’s a close up of one of the rows:
Same block, but in different color combinations. If this quilt was made up of 30 different blocks in a riot of colors, that would definitely be a lot more chaos. So that’s the key. Pick one block and make them from several different color combos… and you have a scrap quilt that’s a little ordered.
Tip #2: Finish off the quilt with a uniform border to contain the chaos, even frame it. Using Scrappy North Stars from above, see how adding the plain black border strip in between the blocks and the pieced piano key border adds a bit of order?
Here’s another example that’s a little different. My quilt, Seaside Cottage, is made up of a lot of scrappy nine-patch blocks in the center. The pieced star border adds a bit of uniformity. Even thought the star blocks are in various colors, the blocks themselves are a little “quieter” than the scrappy nine-patches.
Tip #3: Add a uniform element within the quilt that also serves to create a secondary design. In my quilt, Follow the Stars, I added some black squares into the blocks that help to create a secondary design.
Here’s the whole quilt to show how the design created by the black parts of the blocks adds another element to this otherwise simple log cabin quilt.
When you have a stabilizing element like the black in these blocks, you can then position those blocks in other directions to create other secondary designs within the quilt. This will calm the quilt by giving the viewer’s eye a pattern to follow.
Here’s a smaller version of adding a stabilizing unit. I added stars in one color to these table runners.
In Loop-d-Loop, the dark stars calm the “chaos” of the multi-colored blocks.
Unplanned Scrappy
The quilts above are in the category of a planned scrap quilt. You’re planning the type of blocks, or choosing a border, or picking a uniform color or element to incorporate. Now lets look at some of what I call “unplanned” scrap quilts. These are quilts where I did not choose the color scheme prior to making the blocks. I just sat in from of a bin of strips and scraps and made each block.
However, I still worked in a stabilizing element by choosing a uniform color to work into each block, even if it was a different fabric print. The result was a riot of color, created by all the different colors n each block, and a secondary design the tones down the quilt.
The other fun thing about an unplanned scrap quilt is to put colors together that you would not ordinarily pair up. Actually in any scrap quilt I think you can do this. Here’s an example of some unusual combinations in some of my quilts:
Don’t be afraid to pair colors together, like the light blue and the red in the star block on the left. These are colors you may not put together in a three or four color quilt, but in a scrap quilt you can get away with the combination. The viewer’s eye will be busy!
Building a Stash
Something I like to cover when I speak at guilds is how to build a stash to allow you to create scrap quilts. There’s a few ways to build a stash if you haven’t already started one.
Option #1: Every time you are cutting out a quilt project, cut up the leftover fabric instead of just stacking it in a pile on a shelf. If you pre-cut it into smaller pieces or strips, you’ll have fabrics in lots of colors to start a scrap quilt.
Option #2: When you shop for fabric, shop pre-cuts. Most stores have fat quarters, 10″ pre-cuts and 2 1/2″ strips for sale. You can stock up and sort them by color when you get home. Then you’re ready to dive in to make a scrap quilt.
Option #3: Making my own pre-cuts of all sizes and strips cut from a piece of fabric and stored is how I build a stash. I like to shop at the quilt store and buy1 yard cuts of fabric in a variety of color prints and then cut them up into the different sizes. Here’s my mini video on how I do that.
Once everything is cut and sorted by size and color, I store them in tubs like those below. This way when it’s time to make blocks for a scrap quilt, I can pull out the tubs and have a selection of fabrics in the sizes and colors I want.
So that’s it for this week. I hope you enjoyed some of my processes for making my scrap quilts. I hope you try a scrap quilt if you haven’t already. I bet you’ll love it. Start with a pattern for a quilt that only uses one block design, then make those blocks from several different color combinations. You will be surprised how fun it is!
Leave a comment or ask questions below. I’ll enter you into a drawing for my Scrappy North Stars Pattern. The drawing will be on Monday, March 18th. Good luck! **We have a winner! Congrats, Kathy Willis!**
Happy Quilting
Deanne
