Summer Applique Musings

With the summer heat upon us in June, I have an appliqued
bridal quilt well underway.  Hand sewing in an air conditioned
room is my recipe for the summer heat.

Experience is the best teacher for me and, this, my latest
applique effort is the culmination of all those that have gone
before.  First off, I do not like white or pastels.  All my appliques
are colors of nature, midtones, mottled, marbled, tone on tone and
speckled. Small and oddball pieces and colors saved especially for the purpose.  As a background I have used ecru, tan, camel and pale blues and greens.  With the advent of such marvelous marbles, speckles and batiks, I have gravitated in that direction.  With this new work, I used as the central medallion a ground of very pale pink on pink in florals and swirls which reads as a pale solid from a distance and dove grey as the succeeding rounds between the heavily pieced borders of fuschia and teal.

Though I have never used pink to any great degree, I am thrilled with the effect of the contrast of the peach, deep lavender and deep rose flowers and the true green of the leaves and vines upon the pale pink and dove grey.  I can visualize the use of pale peach ground and every shade of orange flowers, pale lavender ground and every shade of purple irises and tulips and a rosy beige ground with all deep roses to fuschia.  Truthfully, I would never have chosen these combinations, and certainly not pink, except that I had them on hand and used them experimentally.  Who knew?

Whether I like it or not, my natural inclination at my present stage of quilt development is to visualize almost all that I do in a medallion setting.  So many years of blocks and squares seem to have become tiresome.  So, yes, I’m making an original medallion  quilt of country style floral motifs with leaves and vines with the central motif and the succeeding rounds separated by intricate pieced borders.  And I’m enjoying every air conditioned minute of it as the minute pieces gravitate everywhere.

Photos to follow in the Fall.