Monday, September 29, 2008

Center of diamond crazy quilt


By golly, I thought I had posted the center of this quilt already.

So, here it is. The background is brown velvet. The roses are made of satin, each petal is made separately, then sewn onto the velvet. The forget-me-nots and daisies are silk ribbon. The leaves are silk chenille thread. I hand-dyed the butterfly and hummingbird lace motifs.

Diamond Block for Crazy Quilt

I'm working on a crazy quilt that will be composed of diamond shaped patches. It is based on an antique crazy quilt that I saw. It will be a combination of highly embellished crazy quilt patches and "whole" patches. Some of the whole patches will be velvet with chenille embroidery. Four of the patches will be these youths in costume. The youths are based on line drawings from Victorian booklets I have in my collection. There were no directions for making up the design, simply a line drawing. This allowed the imagination of the needleworker to take over and do whatever she felt best. In a few Victorian crazy quilts, I have seen figures that have been portrayed dimensionally. I decided to try my hand at that. So, the face was painted onto Peau du Soie fabric. Then, all the roses were embroidered with silk floss. Next, the costume was added. I think it turned out well. Now, to finish the other three youths.