Challenge #3

Hi all --

I am going to pose the next challenge even though the current challenge is not technically due till the end of next month.  We sometimes have some open spaces in our calendars to get started early, and even if not, we always think about our next pieces for quite a while before we actually start sewing.  So I thought I would get this up right now.

As I count the months, challenge #3 is due at the end of June, so we have plenty of time.  (Tell me if I have calculated wrong.)

I suggest we use the same size as before -- 40 x 80 cm, in portrait orientation (tall and thin).  The challenge: have part of your quilt be in large scale, and part of it in small scale.

That means part of the quilt will have large pieces, and the other part will have small pieces.  Or if you're working in surface design, part of the quilt will be relatively sparse and the other part will be dense.  Or one part will have big flowers and the other part will have small flowers.  Or whatever other way you choose to interpret your "scale."

Here's an example of what I'm talking about.  This is my Quilt National '11 piece.  The yellow part on top is relatively sparse (large scale) , while the green part on the bottom has lots more lines and tinier bits of fabric in between  (small scale).  At least that's how I would interpret the challenge for my own kind of piecing.  You will no doubt interpret it differently for the way you like to work.

By the way, following Mags' comment on her thumbprint quilt earlier this week, I think it's perfectly OK to use the 40 x 80 size as a general approximation, not an exact measurement.  It's hard to make a quilt come out to an exact size, no matter how careful you are.  Quilting takes up some of the fabric, and it's hard to tell in advance how much bigger you should make the top to compensate.  The only way to get a perfect size is to make the quilt deliberately too big, quilt it, then be prepared to cut off whatever you need.

I think that leads to bad design -- I sure don't want to have to wait till the very end to find out that my piece is two inches too big, and then have to decide whether to cut it off the right side or the left side.  I have already decided that I want that much of an edge for reasons of design and composition and I don't want to have to cut it off.  Or even worse, have to add some on because the quilt ended up a bit too narrow.

So I think we all should shoot for 40 x 80, or whatever size the assignment calls for, but if we end up a bit off that's fine.  The quilts will all look fine in a gallery if they're all pretty much the same size and shape.  At least that's my opinion.  What do you all think?