Quilter’s Guide to Design
Ever fallen in love with a quilt pattern but wished it came in your colors, your size, or your style? I’ve got simple solutions in my new lecture for Creative Spark: Quilter's Guide to Design. When changing colors, pay attention to the value placement if you want to keep the look of the original. When changing size, keep the math simple by using a multiple—so 6” blocks between 9” or 12”.
As a beginning quilter, I followed someone else’s patterns but always wanted to design my own quilts. Some of my designs turned out great; others not so much! What was missing? I needed to understand more about design.
As quilters, we have the design principle of Repetition down—we repeat blocks a lot! The principles of Unifying and Variety are on opposite sides of the spectrum. If everything is unified, everything is the same and boring! If everything is varied, nothing goes together and you have chaos. In the lecture I explain some simple guidelines on how to calm down too much variety or add variety for more interest.
Take the plunge and let your creativity out! Good design transcends style boundaries. You can learn how to make design choices that truly reflect your personal style and confidently experiment to make quilts that are uniquely your own.
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Blog Post by Julia Graves
