Hello Everyone,
Often times we, as quilters, see those beautiful fabric panels and are not quite sure how to integrate them into a quilt. This post shows just one example of how you can use a panel and not have it look like one.
One of my customers, Janet, brings me some beautiful quilts to quilt. Recently, she brought a quilt that is made up of one panel. How she used it was to cut the panel into blocks, then to put sashing in between the blocks and added two borders.
From afar, this quilt looks like a beautifully appliqued quilt. But it is not. The sashing really helps in making it look more like a pieced and appliqued quilt.
Then I added my quilting. I treated it very much like a pieced quilt. It was all custom quilted, with special motifs in each block, border, and sashing.
Each block was also stitched in the ditch to frame it up. Click on the pictures to see the detail.
Janet likes to use a muslin backing. It really shows off the quilting and the detail. So in summary, a panel doesn't have to look like a panel. The piecer has to think outside the box and the quilter needs to treat it like any other quilt.
If any of you have any great ideas or treatments for a panel, I would love to hear about them in your comments or e-mails. Don't forget to listen to my 10th podcast episode all about quilting tools and gadgets. Find it in iTunes or just click on the icon on my left side bar or you can click here.
One last item, you need to go to Lila Tueller's blog to enter the giveaway for a beautiful quilt!
Until Next Time...
