Back again!

Probably best not to say too much about my blogging record last year (2 posts). Instead, here is a picture of my 2015 JQs (journal quilts) so far. These are just the top layer and I have not yet added the wadding, backing and stitching.

This year's Contemporary Quilt group 'rules' are that the size must be 6" x 12" and either all portrait or all landscape. (Click the pink and black CQ logo in the right margin to visit the group's website.)

My first four (which I have to finish by 30 April) use fabric that I monoprinted at a workshop with Sarah Burgess at last month's NWCQ meeting. As a group we have chosen 'landscape' as our theme this year, which is why these show mountains.

Thanks for visiting.

Journal Quilts for 2013

Under the 'rules', 2013's journal quilts had to be finished by midnight on 31 December. I'm pleased to say that I finished mine by Tuesday lunchtime (not at all at the last minute), and here is the full set:

Looking at them all together, their variety is what stands out for me. Apart from March and April's, no two are similar, although seven used sheer fabrics in different ways and three used fabric I had painted or printed using thickened dyes. 

For this year, I would like to produce a more coherent series, with a clear development throughout the year. The shape for 2014 is 8 inches square and there has to be a line connecting two of the sides.

Best Wishes for a Happy and Creative New Year!

October's JQ - Manchester in the rain

Continuing to work up Journal Quilts using samples from the devoré workshop in September with Dionne Swift, here is one using a piece of velvet. To teach us the basic technique and to get us thinking about positive and negative shapes, for our first task we cut shapes out of a sheet of paper which we then arranged to form a negative mirror-image. We then used this to screen print with the devoré paste. Here is my piece:

I used the top half for my JQ and added buildings in the background using layers of nylon organza. Here is the result:

It looks like a typical day in Manchester, low clouds, rain and not much light. Note the lights on in the tower blocks in the background.

September's JQ - Reflections

I've turned one of my devoré samples from September into a JQ. It has only taken me three months to get round to it!

I selected my favourite section from the satin sample which was inspired by reflections in office windows.

Then backed it with two layers of black nylon organza to give it support. Hand quilting in a grid holds the layers together and I hemmed the edges by hand too. Here is the result.

Now, just three more to finish this year!

Journal quilts - June to August

This is a quick catch up of the Summer's Journal Quilts, continuing to use sheer fabrics in different ways.

June - Like May's, this is another JQ made completely of layers of nylon organza. Irregular-shaped buildings against the city skyline.

July - following on from a TWL meeting on paper lamination, I produced this cityscape using paper lamination with a collage of magazine text.

August - Inspired by a book making workshop, this uses laminated and folded paper to make windows which open to show prints of reflections in windows.

This theme is proving interesting. Look out for the final four later in the year.

Working with sheers

I've been experimenting with working with sheers this month, for a session with Textile Without Limits. Here are a few of my samples, plus my 'May' Journal Quilt. Work by the rest of the group can be seen on the TWL blog (see list on left).

Samples showing layers of sheer fabrics

Journal quilt - untitled as yet. 'Misty City' perhaps?

I found Margaret Beal's 'Fusing Fabric' very helpful and enjoyed playing with the soldering iron I had had in the cupboard for 'a few years'. A second JQ is currently 'work in progress' and uses the soldering iron extensively for mark making, as in the following sample.

Mark making sample

Thanks for dropping in.

From print blocks to Journal Quilts

I started printing fabric at a Textile Without Limits meeting on 21 April. I hadn't had much time to think about what I would do at the meeting, so took along a box of things that would allow me to do block printing or screen printing.

Over lunch I came up with a plan to make some print blocks. I based these on a couple of shapes in paintings by Hundertwasser; a window shape and the ubiquitous stripes. The print blocks were easy to make. I cut shapes out of a thin foam with a sticky backing and stuck them to an offcut of mount board.

Some of the pieces were discharged rather than printed. The discharge paste was great fun and easy to use. I have used household bleach before, but we used Formosol mixed with print paste, which was much easier to control. You use it just like thickened dye. After applying it to your fabric, you just have to wait for it to dry and then iron to activate. The design appears like magic and gets paler the more you iron it.

Here are the results of my printing session, after I had washed and ironed them. The piece top right is a small square of discharge velvet. The print blocks are also shown.

Then I started piecing the fabric into journal quilts. The first one combined rectangles into strips and the printed windows formed rows of buildings, with taller buildings behind. Incorporating the black, discharged fabric was a challenge as it stood out beside the red and yellow. I have tried to blend it in by picking up the black colour in the quilting. This quilting outlines the shapes in the fabric.

In the second JQ I challenged myself to move away from rectangles and to use more irregular shapes. I started adding scraps of blue and purple fabric to pieces of the yellow, printed fabric. Then I built these up into irregular, wedge shaped strips and finally into a rectangular panel. Not sure how successful the overall design is here, the middle is OK but the left hand strip is less successful. If I'd had more time, I would have unpicked it and made changes, but I only had one day left (and that a working day). I was also unsure how best to quilt it, but moved again away from the obvious (outlining the printing), which I thought would take too long. I tried instead stitching window shapes across the piecing. These are quite (too?) subtle and could perhaps be made more visible in some way.

I got both JQs finished just in time to meet the deadline on the last day of April.

Quilters' Guild Conference and AGM in Nottingham

Last weekend I went to the Quilters' Guild Annual Conference and AGM which was held on the Jubilee Campus of Nottingham University. I enjoyed the event as well as spending time on the campus which has some interesting buildings. Red tiles seemed popular!

On the Sunday I took a workshop with Laura Wasilowski. We each started with two pieces of brightly coloured fabric like these.

Then we cut and fused to make crazy pictures. I just had to make a cityscape (for April's Journal Quilt) and so far it looks like this.

I've started adding hand stitching and hope to be able to trim and finish the edges by next weekend. Watch this space!

Work in progress

I have been meaning to post a picture of what I was working on at (and since) the retreat last month. The first piece was a UFO from a Lisa Walton workshop last October. She gave two workshops and a talk for Region 13 (of the Quilters' Guild) and I did the 'Luscious Landscapes' workshop, but I had hardly started the stitching by the end of the day. So I spent a couple of days doing lots of machine stitching on it and this is what it looks like now.

Below the landscape is my first Journal Quilt (JQ) for 2013 (before stitching). As I mentioned before, these will be on the theme of 'Cityscapes' and this one is a fairly abstract design. I plan for at least some of the JQs to be exercises based on design principles and this one uses scale and colour to show a contrast between the nearer and further away buildings. I have now finished this one and here it is.

It looks rather sombre and restrained, particularly next to the landscape. Perhaps that's just the result of the fabrics I had with me, or does it say something about how I see cities?

Working to a theme

I've been feeling slightly overwhelmed by all the quilting challenges. They all sound so interesting, but I only made two quilts last year and am unlikely to make more than 2 or 3 this year.

So I have decided to forget about most of the challenges and pick a theme to work to instead. By coincidence, this year's Contemporary Quilt Journal Quilt Project requires that the 12 monthly quilts reflect a theme. The size this year is 12" x 8" in landscape format and the theme must be chosen in advance and kept to throughout the year.

So I have chosen a theme, which is 'cityscapes'. I have signed up for the JQ Project and have started to gather images and to fill a small sketchbook. Here is my first sketchbook page, which (typically for me) is quite realistic but I hope to stretch myself and to explore a range of interpretations over the year.

View from the train, approaching Manchester Victoria.

The last four months' Journal Quilts

I just managed to get my 2010 Journal Quilts (JQs) finished yesterday, although the dark blue fabric in December's wouldn't scan properly. I had very pretty purple and green stripes in the blue areas. So here are the final four for 2010, starting with...

September - I made a print block based on a section of my source photograph and printed it in different colours of acrylic paint onto red, green and blue fabric. Here is the block with some of the pieces I printed.

For September I cut up and pieced together several of these to make a 10"x7" piece and hand-quilted in two of the vertical strips, leaving the others unstitched. The red colour is picked up in some of the stitching.

October - I had been thinking about doing a more densely stitched piece, so this takes a small section which I have completely machine-stitched in various shades of blue viscose on a plain blue background. I even did mitred corners on the binding.

November - October's JQ led to another densely stitched piece, this time with the intention on painting after quilting to highlight the raised areas. Clearly this technique needs a bit of practice to work out how each area will appear if there is a pattern in the stitching, but I was quite pleased with the result.

December - Not much time available, so I used some of the printed pieces from September and combined them with plain dark blue pieces. The machine quilting then draws in the shapes from the photograph, linking together the three strips.

I am now waiting to see what size (and orientation) will be set by the Contemporary Quilt Group for 2011. I have already decided on a theme for all my work next year.

Oh, yes... and Happy New Year everyone!

More Journal Quilts

My intentions of posting once a fortnight have already gone slightly awry as I've just realised I am two days late! To make amends, here are another four Journal Quilts, for May to August (I know I have missed April, but I feel it needs more stitching and will show it later).

I started these with a session of monoprinting on green, blue and white fabric using acrylic paints. I rolled the paint onto a piece of glass (one of those kitchen worktop savers from the supermarket), drew shapes into it based on the photo and then placed fabric on top to pick up the design. From the results I picked out a few pieces that I particularly liked which formed the basis of the May and June JQs.

May: I started with the white piece with the clear gondola shapes, then tried different combinations until I found a set of four pieces that went well together. These were stitched together then layered with wadding and a backing before machine quilting to emphasise various shapes.



June: Similar approach to May, I started with the white piece with the green lines, but this time added appliqué gondolas. Details are again added with machine quilting.

July: I had the idea of using positive and negative versions of some of the spirals and cross shapes. After cutting out several pieces I arranged them on a backing piece and tried laminating them with cellulose paste (I had some left over from Summer School), but ended up peeling off most of the pieces and rearranging them. Some of the quilting echoes and some crosses over the underlying shapes. Note the daring addition of orange to my blue/green colour scheme!

August: Walking the Offa's Dyke path took up nearly three weeks of August, so this was done with the 31 August deadline fast approaching. I tried cutting up two pieces of white fabric that I'd printed earlier and rearranging them, drawing on the shapes in the photo. The reflections were made with a sheer fabric cut back to the stitching line and the rest of the stitching was then done from the back using a thick thread in the bobbin.

I was pleased with the effect I achieved with this last one, which looks more like a reflection.

Back to blogging... Journal Quilts Q1

Sorry that it has been a while since I posted anything here. I've not had much time for creative activities this year. One thing I have just about managed to keep up with has been my Journal Quilts or JQs.

I only started these in January and decided to base all this year's on a photograph I took in Manchester. This shows the Wheel of Manchester reflected in Urbis and the distorted image provides lots of interesting shapes and textures to interpret in a range of media.


Here is the photograph and following are my first three JQs.


I went to two workshops in the first quarter of the year, so this first JQ uses one of the things I learnt - silk painting. The design is painted onto fine silk which I backed with a piece of white felt before machine stitching the diagonal lines. After layering with wadding and a backing, I machine quilted around the shapes and finally bound the edges with strips of silk.

Then in March I did a felt-making workshop, so the March JQ is made of felt. The backing is white needle-punch felt and the top layer is a fine silk. The design is formed of different colour prefelts and threads in turquoise and blue. After wet felting, details have been picked out in machine stitching.

And finally, I had a go at making one only using paper. Yes, it is based on the same photograph, but looking at the less recognisable shapes where the struts are reflected and distorted. I wasn't really happy about the outcome, but didn't have time to make a replacement so am having to learn to live with it.