More precisely, this is an equilateral triangle block quilt, my first ever triangular quilting project, and my first experiment of steering away from my comfort zone of traditional, scrappy and cheerful color palettes to taste something more austere and restrained.
A lot of the pieces were cut from Atelier Brunette collections that I bought in Paris last October, so the quilt actually carries quite a bit of sentimental value. However, those fabrics are very thin cotton lawns that I must wash and use the quilt carefully. The advantage of using cotton lawns is that the finished quilt is very soft and delicate, a totally different look than the regular broadcloth quilting cottons.
The quilt was made from stripes of 8" tall triangle blocks. The finished quilt top is large (about 70"x84"). I intended to use it as an accentuate piece for my mid-century style couch.
I treated the quilt top like a canvas and I "drew" on top of it with millions of stitches! I really enjoyed the free motion time spent on this quilt. I harvested more ideas about quilting my future quilts. Sulky viscose thread was used throughout. I love its shine and sleekness, but I found I couldn't wind full bobbins with this thread on my Bernina Q20. The bottom thread would get caught by the bobbin cover very easily because the thread unwinds by itself!! Like my couch quilt, Quilter's Dream Cotton Select batting was used. I love it's softness but next time I would love to try the Supreme line because I love thick and heavy quilts... although it would be difficult to maneuver on the machine.
For all my quilts completed thus far I never had a very specific plan of color arrangement to begin with, and I always wanted the finished quilt top to surprise myself. Sometime it worked but not always. Ben was not a big fan of this quilt. He said the colors are too dark and I had the same feeling. The quilt was finished in June, but I could't find a good location to shoot, to obtain the correct color tones and to capture the delicate details. Finally the 2nd floor hallway of my parent's home won my heart. The grey-ish white wall is a perfect match with my quilt, and it has plenty of natural lights from a skylight and a huge window.
For this quilt I prewashed all fabrics prior to cutting. In the end I didn't see a noticeable difference, so maybe I would not do it again... But I did like the softness of washed fabrics, and I simply steam ironed flat the fabrics. No Best Press, no starching. To avoid stretching, I pinned a lot and I pinned both vertically and horizontally. It worked well. Most blocks met on point. To avoid bulkiness some seams were cut and flipped near the seam intersections.
No quilt is ugly. All finished quilts are lovely =P A quilt is a functional piece of art.
