Fabric Purchases!

Since I was last here I've been away for the weekend. I went to the Festival of Quilts for two days with a couple of friends, staying overnight in Birmingham... old news really as there have already been plenty of blog posts about the show. I usually only go up for one day, so it was rather nice to have the luxury of not feeling like I needed to rush around packing everything into a single day as well as being able to spend time with my friends. Although if I'm honest I had pretty much seen all I wanted to see, bought what I needed to buy and even took a 1 hour workshop all on the first day.

 

 

There were some fabulous exhibitions of work in the galleries from established artists but the one that stood out for me was the solo show by Hungarian artist Eszter Bornemisza, whose delicate, fragmented pieces crossed that boundary from quilts to fine art... actually I'm not sure they could really be classed as quilts but they were stunning.

 

I was also rather taken by the quilts of Ineke van Unen just for their exuberent use of colour.

 

Unfortunately not so many of the competition quilts really grabbed my attention. Maybe I'm just getting too critical but despite some exquisite workmanship, I felt many were let down by design... and far too many look as though they should be on beds, not walls! My preference is for the abstract rather than pictorial and I did rather like this winner of the contemporary quilt category... all made from old shirts and ties!

 

My shopping on Saturday was limited to what I actually needed and I bought a few Kaffe Fassett shot cottons in shades of purple for a cushion I'd been commissioned to make. I spent most of yesterday cutting them up and combining them with some of my stash to make this patchwork cover based on Janice Gunner's wonky log cabin designs.

 

Today it was quilted, piped and made up into a cushion which I'm now a bit reluctant to part with...

 

It matches the sofa in my living room rather too well. But if I keep it I'll only have to make another and I don't really think I can be bothered!

 

My other necessary fabric purchase was to find something that looked vaguely like cat fur. Jacob rather likes the cat pictures by Louis Wain and wanted a tea cosy for his small teapot that matches his tea mug. I made the tea cosy this afternoon but I'm not entirely happy with it... there's not really enough definition. Back to the drawing board with that one...

 

 

But probably not just yet... because I've a third fabric purchase to deal with. This was not on my list of fabric that I needed to buy, but of course having the luxury of a whole extra day to wander around meant I spotted some totally unecessary fabric that I just had to have. This is destined to become another reversible skirt...

 

Watch this space!