What’s Your Quilting Inspiration?

At times I like to talk about what inspires people to create things,  specifically what inspires people to create quilts.  So I want to share with you how I got started quilting, with a peak at my earliest quilt, and things that keep me inspired. I want to hear from you too! I’ll ask a few questions at the end of this post. Answer them in the comments and I will choose a commenter as a winner of a free pattern for the upcoming holiday season.

Inspiration

Inspiration to start quilting can come from a lot of sources. A family member who quilts, especially a parent or sibling in the same home, is how many people are inspired. Sometimes it can be a aunt/uncle or grandparent that you visited often when growing up. And, of course, there are your friends.

My grandmother was an avid quilter, but she was several states away and we saw her maybe 2 times a year. Also, she passed away when I was 9 years old, so I did not have a lot of time with her. My sisters had no interest in sewing and my mom could barely hem a pair of pants. So sometimes it surprises me that I do what I do.

How did I catch the quilting bug? I actually landed on quilting because I was looking for something to do as a newlywed while my husband played league softball. I saw a catalog from the local community college advertising an adult education quilting class. So I said “why not?”. The fact that I chose a very difficult pattern, the LeMoyne Star, and a queen size quilt for the class was definitely a rookie mistake but it did not deter me. The fact that the class requirement was to construct it all by hand almost did. Here it is (with Addie as a model!)

Those colors! You can definitely tell what year this quilt was made by those 80’s colors. I sure have evolved when it comes to picking fabrics for my quilts. I also tried my hand at hand quilting, however you can tell I didn’t quilt it enough by all the bare spaces. Since the quilt is the first one I ever made, I can’t bring myself to ever give it up no matter how ugly I think it is. The kids used it over the years to cuddle in while watching TV and now Addie seems to like it.

This class hooked me on quilting, but I did buy a sewing machine so I didn’t have to hand piece blocks ever again!

What inspires me today is the large variety of beautiful Civil War reproduction fabrics and paging through books of antique quilts. That fabric is my favorite to use and when I find a new line, it inspires me even more. The antique quilts I find in the books often have many traditional blocks like Log Cabin or Churn Dash. I love looking at these books and dreaming up ways I can put a new “spin” on these blocks.

Here are two examples of quilts where I took traditional blocks and worked them into a new design.

For Rail Fence Blooms on the left I used the traditional rail fence block to create a large center star, including the star points. I added one of my favorite things, floral appliqué, to give it a unique flair. For Wildflower Lane on the right, I took a traditional log cabin block and put it on point to create a hanging garden basket look for the flower appliqués. 

Here’s a few other unique log cabin inspired designs:

Another inspiring block for me is the Churn Dash block. I have used this block in both large and small quilts. In the quilt, above left, I even combined a churn dash with a log cabin design for some extra design fun! Here’s some of my churn dash inspired quilts.

The first two quilts, High Prairie Blooms and Bountiful, have a churn dash block with a star in the center as the principle design. For Star Dash, I had a little fun making the large, center churn dash block scrappy. 

Other Design Inspiration Sources

Other places I have found design inspiration are not related to the quilting world. I find inspiration is interesting things like buildings, sidewalks, windows, etc. Some of these things have inspired the blocks and design for the quilt top center or for the borders. Here’s a few examples.

The design on the right has obvious inspiration for a border. A checkerboard pieced border with a plain border on each side to frame a quilt like I did here in Constellations:

The design on the left inspired a scallop border design for a pattern I designed for a magazine:

Another inspiration was this pattern I saw on some upholstery. It led me to design a pattern with a chevron design, Celebrations:

Design Inspiration from Antique Quilts

Finally, I like to page through books of antique quilts to find inspiration. Some of those inspirations came from album or autograph quilts like this one with this block below. The traditional name for this block is the Album Cross block.

The block above (right) is from an album quilt made in the 1840’s in New York state. Quilts made from these blocks were usually presented to someone who was leaving a community. Friends and family of the person receiving the quilt would write or embroider a message in the block. 

But of course for me, I wanted to find a way to make this block easier… translation, with NO “Y” or set in seams. I hate doing those so I do not like to design quilt patterns with those types of seams. Here is the block I came up with:

To make the block above, I created this unit below, left. And when I made four and stitched them together, I got the look of the vintage Album Cross block (right) without the stress of set in seams.

This group of blocks turned into the table runner on the right in Scrap Basket Duo.

So that’s it for my inspiration that started and sustains my quilting and some of my favorite design inspirations. Let me know in the comments the answers to these questions below and you will be entered into a drawing for my pattern, Wrap it Up.

Here’s the questions:

1. What inspired you to start quilting?
2. What block or design inspires you?
3. Any other things not related to quilting that inspires you?

The drawing will be on Monday, September 21st. ***We have a winner! Congrats, Janet Riley!***

Happy Quilting!
Deanne