Sunday, February 14, 2010

Medallion

I started out knowing I wanted to play with the triangles in the Ocean Waves quilt but after sewing a partial lozenge I realized I sooo did not want to play with triangles on the edges and Y-seams.

This is a picture of the back of the Oceans Wave quilt that I love so much (image from Amish Abstractions: Quilts from the Collection of Faith and Stephen Brown).

I'm thinking now of combining the two sides of the quilt and using the triangles to form one or two borders in a medallion quilt like this:


I'm also considering making one bold border in the triangles and maybe getting some of the Ocean Waves motion with a string pieced border (these blocks are just partially done):


Looking at this in a photo, I get a different perspective. Might be too busy. Or maybe these two borders need more room between them. I've been thinking of using black or red for the solid between borders, but actually love how light and lovely this looks.


The plan right now is to do a word in the middle. Haven't made my mind up yet. This is the third quilt in my Rumspringa series, so maybe it should be Love. Or Live or Hope or Be Kind or Be Sweet.... 


Any thoughts on the borders or word choice????


I'll still have a lot of playing to do, to work on getting the sizes right. By the way, those half-square triangles finish at 1.5" squares. I figured making them small would help with the sparkly-ness.


I started with 2" strips and cut the triangles with the Easy Angle ruler. I made a bin of darks and a bin of lights and mixed the fabrics - in each bin - up so that I wouldn't always get the same colors matching up. Some fabrics like the reds ended up in both bins.


I have sooo much more work to do. It has been wonderful to see all of your fabrics and blocks and words and even a finished top! 

11 comments:

Jan said...

Oh....but I loved the ocean waves. Why don't you divide that solid black pieces into four, diagonally, making the diagonal ocean wave sections into squares that could be pieced easier? After quilting, you wouldn't see that the area had been divided. Or, you could use different blacks to emphasize that it had been divided! (Not sure I'm articulating this effectively.)
I expect that anything you do with your wonderful triangles will be a success, but I hate to see you abandon the ocean waves idea.

sophie said...

I love where you are taking the design; it has strong ties to the original while being it's own quilt design and definitely "you."

I think the phrase OCEAN WAVES could be a great springboard for choosing words.

Tonya Ricucci said...

I did already think of dividing the negative space up so I could avoid Y-seams, but I was still left with a lot of biasy triangles around the edges of the lozenges. I'm not actually a big fan of Ocean Waves, so doesn't bother me to not be doing it.

Clare said...

Hi Ton. You know what I'm like. I like the idea of the HST's and the strings on the white, with a bigger border between them.

Perhaps do the centre black, with the word in the pale pink (if that is what it is). A white border between the two and then black again. Don't do a pink border, except, perhaps for the yukky binding bit.

If you are following the Rumspringa series, how about Life? This quilt is going to be so full of it.

Sorry - not very constructive. I'm all coloured out!

Kristin Shields said...

The words are the hardest for me to choose, but I like all the words mentioned. I can't imaging using all those triangles, but I'm curious to see what you will come up with. I love the Roman stripes blocks too!

Marit said...

Love the idea of the two borders. They are both very pretty individually, and a good combination. I think coming up with the words are the most challenging part (sorry, no good ideas) but they will make a very interesting center! The size of your triangles are amazing, and they look great! It will be fun to see your next step here

; )

Teresa Rawson said...

Your triangles are looking great! I love the idea of string-pieced triangle blocks...what if you did those in opposite corners, branching out a bit, then did your lovely words in the rest of the space...might be fun to use those string blocks sparingly instead of uniformly around the triangles.

Just a thought...I love watching your progress...

In stitches,
Teresa :o)

Kathy said...

I like the idea of the strippy blocks for the border....maybe separate them from the triangles with a solid red inner border? Maybe you could do a medallion pattern with pieced and then plain borders??

Exuberantcolor/Wanda S Hanson said...

I really like the partially finished string blocks and think a big chunk of white/light added to the corners instead of more strings would have a big impact.

Kim said...

It really interest me how this creation is evolving and your thoughts along the way.....this part of quilting is all lost to us when we just view a finished quilt.
Now, instead, we are all getting to travel on the journey of each others quilt making.

I find it endlessly inspiring.

Happy Sewing

Quiltdivajulie said...

Glad to see you liberating your original plan! I could not bear the making of all those triangles, myself.

Liking the split border idea, a LOT.

GO, GO, GO!!!