Heavy metal/hard rock quilt

I needed to make a quilt that had a heavy metal/hard rock vibe to it. When I was out at Miller's Dry Good May 6th and 7th working I scoured the place for fabric that I thought would work. I snagged this flame fabric when a customer brought it to my cutting counter. I bought the 3 yards that were left. It was pretty cool and would add a little color to what was going to be a dark quilt. I also found a guitar fabric with a gray background and black guitars (forgot to take a picture, but you can see it in one of the pictures below - with the wreath design over the guitar it makes the guitar look like the end of the guitar is an ax. Very metal!) I was looking for skull fabric, but the lovely woman that is the assistant manager said in her sweet voice "we don't buy that type of fabric." I had a good laugh and the Amish women were chucking at me!


I started this quilt Sunday morning about 7:30 a.m. Here is the center. I used the Decolorant product that I bought at the Sewing and Quilting Expo in Cleveland a couple of months ago. It turned out ok, but I think I should have put the product on a little heavier. I used a stencil I had picked up cheap last year for the letters.


I decided to start out with approximately yard long pieces. I took the guitar and flame fabric, layered them (about a 12" wide piece) and double cut them, switched the pieces up and sewed them together. This was all improv piecing. I headed back into my fabric storage room to see if I could find anything else that would fit the theme of this piece. Score! I found some guitars on a black backgound, some fabric with Asian writing, and black sheet music fabric - perfect! I also had planned on using the fabric with words on it that are related to guitars so thank goodness for a stash and collecting music fabric!


All the pieces are layed out so now it was a matter of sewing and fitting them together.


Here is the top finished. It turned out 63.25" x 76.5". I had it done by 1 P.M. Sunday.


I had this gray music print in my stash that I got off the discount shelf when it was marked down again for just a few dollars a yard - its nice stuff too so I thought it would be a good backing fabric. Since I could not find any skull fabric for the front, I decided to put a strip of my "Quilting Pirates" when I joined the gray backing fabric together. I think it adds an edgyness and humor to the quilt. I had the quilt pin basted by 4 P.M. Sunday. I then went outside and did 2 hours of yardwork - weed wacked, mowed, and trimmed a tree.



After a focused week of intense quilting I completed the quilt.