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In this lesson, as we look further into how the type of fabric choices you make can affect the outcome of your quilt, we focus on the often misunderstood taupe palette. This group of fabrics is more often than not relegated to what is frequently called the 'beige' category. But, understanding the subtle nuances of taupe go way beyond just being mere beige.
As you know, working within a single monochromatic color (Lesson 14) can be challenging for any quilter. Monochromatic literally means, "containing or using only one color." And yet, the taupe color palette can create a sense of simplicity, calm, harmony, relaxation, and sophistication.

Examples of the variations can be seen in the wall display (on the right) and in the woven rush seat (below).

At first glance the grouping may seem to just be shades of brown, but step in as we take a closer look at the small fabric stack to the right. The fabrics are actually a tone of red-violet. Thirty years ago, Japanese quilt artist Yoko Saito visited the US and was fascinated by the slightly faded or washed out look of American antique quilts. Wanting to recreate this softer 'antique look' in quilts, Yoko began to design fabrics to replicate this look. In her book, Japanese Taupe Color Theory: A Study Guide, she suggests that one should compare the fabric colors to foods that we know.

For example, let's think of coffee and the variations of colors that can be achieved by the addition of milk. The more milk you add to the coffee, the more muted the original brown becomes. But it is still coffee. What about blue jeans? The more you wash and wear those beloved blue jeans, the more faded and soft they become. Looking at the stack of fabric on the right, it could be said that this color could be plum jam with just a bit of milk added.

If you are not sure when shopping for taupe fabrics, use your Ultimate 3-in-1 Color tool.

While creating a sophisticated taupe grouping of fabrics takes a keen eye, determination, and a good understanding of value (Lesson 19), the end results can be stunning. These are not the quilts that shout for attention from across the room, but require you to step in for closer observation. Let's look at some examples of quilts:

Daisy Chain by Alex Anderson. (Image courtesy of Alex Anderson). Boundaries by Linda Beach (Show 1409) [Image courtesy of Linda Beach]

The Scenery of Gameunsa Temple by Hyesook Kim. (Image by TheQuiltShow). Snail Run by Alex Anderson. (Image courtesy of Alex Anderson).

Sundial Coverlette by Carolyn Konig. (Show 1411) [Image by TheQuiltShow]. For Four Who Stood Tall by Kathie Briggs. (Image courtesy of Kathie Briggs)

Priscilla Knoble (Show 1505) has used her fluency in Japanese and quilting knowledge to share the world of Japanese quilting books with those desiring to make their own pieces. Her understanding of the Japanese esthetic and quilting techniques are a huge aid for those desiring to gain an understanding of the Japanese style of quilting. Priscilla shares Yoko Saito's focus on a broad range of taupe fabrics to achieve interest for the viewer.

How Yoko Saito Uses a Variety of Fabrics
While Still Achieving That Monochromatic Color Scheme

by Priscilla Knoble (Show 1505)
(All images provided by Priscilla Knoble unless otherwise noted)

Sometimes I think that the concept of “color” is something we take for granted unless it appears in such a way as to stun our senses for a brief moment in time. Perhaps nowhere does this happen more to those who love fabric and color than when we see a quilt that jumps out at us. Sometimes it is the pattern, sometimes it is the texture, although I would venture to say that it is probably most often the colors that the artist used that has us catching our breath.

When it comes to color, the term “monochrome” might be misconstrued as monotonous or boring. I think that this can be true if one uses one flat color over a large space. Think how dull our world would be if nature used only one color/tone/hue! The multitude of greens when looking at a garden, the browns that are woven together in the bark of a tree– all of those slight and subtle differences add great depth and dimension. Painters also achieve beauty and depth when they mix a number of color values. Much like nature and art, achieving magic when we quilt could be as simple as the monochromatic fabrics we choose.

Yoko Saito, a famous quilt designer, artist, teacher and shop owner from Japan, is perhaps best known for her great influence on what we often call Japanese Taupes. While Japanese Taupes come in many soft colors, they are most often used in a fairly monochromatic way. In her book, Yoko Saito’s Japanese Taupe Color Theory – A Study Guide, she explains it in her foreword, “Taupe is not just grey, or ‘tea-colored.’ The world of taupe that I created encompasses not only a variety of colors, but the subtle manipulation of them. Take a hue and add a tint or shade in small degrees from light to dark. Or imagine steeping tea and watching the color becoming deeper and deeper until the flavor is robust. This is the simplicity and complexity of taupe colors.”

Ms. Saito is ingenious in her use of monochromatic colors. Often for any background or area of a project that calls for essentially one color, she will use a variety of hues and shades to achieve movement that attracts the eye. She also goes one step further than color and uses a combination of textures by mixing cotton prints and hand-dyed woven fabric. This is demonstrated wonderfully in both of the color collections that she put together, Pearl and Sand.

Yoko Saito Pearl Collection and quilt sample

Yoko Saito Sand Collection and quilt sample

Adding a variety of fabrics with differing hues and shades of a color is an easy way to cause someone to do a double-take when looking at your creation. Why not try this the next time you start a project that has monochromatic areas and see what a difference it might make.

 
   Block 1                                                               Block 2

Practice Exercise: Taupe in your Stash

1. Collect fabrics you have in your stash in groups of blues, greens, chocolates, or oranges.
2. See how many fall into the taupe category. 
3. From the groups, build either of the blocks or one's of your choosing.

Click here to download the Quilt Block 1.

Click here to download Quilt Block 2.

Click here for more topics related to The Art of Quilt Design program.

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G and I are blessed in that we have a massive playground provided by Mother Nature right outside our doors. But, for many "sheltering in place" means driving a distance to breath in all that nature has to provide. We live in a tourist town in the middle of a forest and as some counties and states have been gingerly moving forward into different phases, it is obvious that collectively we are craving fresh air and wide open spaces.

 

But, what if you do not have the option to jump in a car and hit the road? As a quilter there is an opportunity to bring nature inside! The whole idea of combining nature, art, and quilting is so outside my box. I recognize in this period of our history we have to get creative to keep our sanity!

 

Sooooo, when I visited the Stitchin Post in Sisters, Oregon I was WOW'd by how the gallery exhibit transported me to a beautiful space created by Grace Grinnell and inspired by Mother Nature!

 

 

Just like nature is abstract, Grace has captured a variety of views that embrace that which is the world out there! I hope you enjoy a peek at a few of her interpretations and it inspires you to bring the world outside into your space. These pieces are for sale if you are interested...just call the Stitchin Post! Someday soon you will be able to visit and see these and many others, as these are just a fraction of what is on display.

 

Paper Amaryllis

 

Gansu Mountains

 

Below Water

 

Night Lake

 

Have a wonderful week! Be safe and start dreaming about bringing Nature inside your life!

 

Stay tuned and travel along with us on Quilt Roadies.

Click here for Anna's blog.

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Inspired by Pointillism, the art of acrylic paint dotting, Kyra Reps created the center Mandala in her quilt Serendipity using circles of various sizes. Even more impressive than the hundreds of circles used throughout the quilt, is the fact that Kyra individually hand-turned and hand-sewed each one!

Serendipity by Kyra Reps of Northwood, Iowa was featured in the Appliqué, Large category, sponsored by EZ Quilting, at Houston 2019.

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"Fill the space, turn the corner, inspiration is everywhere..." In today's Facebook Live, Alex continues her tutorial on quilting design - it's fun AND functional!

Join Alex LIVE today June 15, 2020 at 10am PST, 1pm EST, and 6pm London time.

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Be prepared to be knocked off your feet by Numquam Cede, a Baltimore Album quilt by Elisabeth Frolet. She designed the appliqué work herself and included many personal references, spending 3000 hours over a period of three years working on it. And the cherry on top? Elisabeth hand quilted it as well.

Numquam Cede by Elisabeth Frolet of Dunwoody, Georgia won Honorable Mention in the Appliqué, Large category, sponsored by EZ Quilting, at Houston 2019.

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A New Machine Quilting Motif!

Anchors Aweigh, Quilters! It’s all hands on-deck as Lori Kennedy at WeAllSew gives you step-by-step instructions for stitching a row of anchors to fill a border. 

Click here for tutorial.

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Lisa Walton, textile artist and past President of SAQA, recently sat down with Ricky to talk about the creation of his quilt, Northern Lights  , as part of her series of interviews called Quilt Stories  . Lisa has been interviewing many interesting quilters about specific quilts and will also be sharing them online. 

You can watch Lisa here at TQS in Show 2503.

Click here for more inspired Quilt Stories.

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Hungarian Rhapsody is a special quilt that Ricky has brought new life to. Vibrant and colorful, it is sure to get any quilter excited to start their next piecing venture.

You can learn piecing from Ricky in our Piecing Masterclass Part 2, and Show 804: Create Your Own Rhapsody Quilt - Part 2.

Original Photo by Ricky Tims

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Why is it that some quilts never leave the depths of the WIP (Work In Progress) pile? Did you lose interest, or did the fabrics and color choices just not play together well? For the next several lessons we will take a brief pause from our focus on the fundamentals of color, to look at how and what fabric choices you make can result in a flat or less dynamic quilt.

Scale, value, and pattern can make a huge difference when it comes to selecting fabrics for your quilt project. It's one thing to understand the principles of the terms, but another matter when it comes to actually putting a fabric group together.

Let's look at Kissin' Cousins by Susan Carlson. This WIP illustrates the wide array of fabrics Susan has used in her collage work to create depth and realism on the faces of the two children. In the detail of the girl's face below, you will notice the masterful way she combined fabrics with prints of different sizes, themes, and colors to give depth and interest. Susan's skillful use with what many would consider fabrics that absolutely would not play well together, in fact, actually do make for a very harmonious grouping.

Kissin' Cousins by Susan Carlson (Show 801). (Detail)

Another master when it comes to gathering a very diverse fabric collection for quilt projects is Karen K. Stone (Show 1611). Two examples that showcase the vast array of fabrics, patterns, scale, and size she customarily uses in her work are Lilith and Clam Session.

Lilith by Karen K. Stone. (Image by TheQuiltShow.com). Clam Session by Karen K. Stone (Image by TheQuiltShow.com)

But where does one start when it comes to deciding on what fabrics to cull or purchase? As a quilter, your local quilt shop is a great resource. Most shops offer pre-cut designer fabric collection bundles, such as charm squares (5" x 5"), jelly rolls (2 1/2" x 45"), layer cakes (10" x 10"), and fat quarter bundles (9" x 22"). These groupings, usually based on a theme, offer a nice array of fabric prints in one complete collection; or let a favorite fabric be the inspiration for your grouping. And don't forget to check out those colored dots along the selvedge of your inspirational fabric, as they are very useful for matching color.

What if the current collections at your local quilt shop don't make you swoon, or you want to build a fabric group from your own stash? Here are a few basic tips to keep you on track.

The basics for creating interest:

Scale / Size - Include a variety of small, medium, and large prints. By including a mix of the three, your work will have more depth and variety.

Value - Include a wide range of light, medium, and dark to avoid your work from reading flat. Are you not sure about relying on your instincts? Use the Ultimate 3-in-1 Color Tool to help solve the mystery. Each of the twenty-four pages illustrates the pure color, tints, shades, and tones of a family, allowing you the opportunity to select from a wide array of fabrics to make a quilt more interesting.

In Show 1307, Alex Anderson shares her method for gathering fabrics when beginning a scrap quilt. From selecting a wide range of fabrics, to the role value plays within a star block, diversity of fabric choice can make a huge difference.

In Show 1413, Leni Levenson Wiener shows what a difference 'zingers' make when selecting fabrics for her trees.

Becky Goldsmith (Show 611, Show 1704, and Show 2401) is an award-winning quilter who teaches both nationally and internationally. She says that, "quilters paint with fabric." And as such the need to understanding how fabric works can mean the difference between a quilt project that is forever doomed to the UFO dungeon or a loved and completed piece.

Working with Predictable vs. Unpredictable Fabrics

by Becky Goldsmith (Show 611, Show 1704, and Show 2401)

Fabric falls into two broad categories: predictable and unpredictable. Predictable fabrics are not ‘better’ than unpredictable fabrics—they just behave differently. When you can see at a glance which category a fabric falls into, it makes choosing fabric for a quilt much easier.

Predictable Fabrics

A predictable fabric can be cut into big or small pieces and it will look the same everywhere it shows up in the quilt. In pieced quilts, that is a very good thing.

Solids

Solids are the most predictable fabric.
No matter how you cut them, they always look the same.

Tone-On-Tones

Tone-on-tone fabrics usually read as a solid at a distance. Tone-on-tone prints can be quiet or visually active. If the values in the print are close together, the fabric will read more as a solid and be ‘quieter’. The more contrast in the print, the more noticeable and visually active the fabric becomes.

Tone-on-tone prints come in all sizes: small-, medium-, and large-scale.

Small Prints

The motifs and colors in small prints are near enough to each other that when cut into small pieces, they look the same no matter what part of the fabric they are cut from.

Some small prints have motifs that are more widely spaced. The designs in the print won’t be exactly the same in the pieces you cut from the fabric, but the print will retain its character. This antique fabric feels open and airy in both large and small sizes.

Medium Prints

Medium prints have obviously bigger motifs than those you find in small prints, but many are still predictable. Look for designs where the colors in the print are mixed together well across the face of the fabric.

Unpredictable Fabric

Unpredictable fabrics are ones where the motifs are often big and widely spaced. When you cut small pieces from unpredictable fabrics, you can’t predict which color will end up where and that can play havoc in repeating blocks.

Big Prints

Most quilters shy away from big prints because they look hard to use, but I encourage you to give them a try. Big prints have an expansive feeling that can add motion and depth to your quilt.

Big Prints

Most quilters shy away from big prints because they look hard to use, but I encourage you to give them a try. Big prints have an expansive feeling that can add motion and depth to your quilt.

When you cut big prints into small pieces, the design is fragmented.
If you bought the print because you liked it as a whole, this can be disconcerting.

These squares, from the big print above far left, are a good example of that.

 

Sometimes colors are segregated into discrete areas. For example, if you cut 2” squares from the rainbow dot fabric (designed by Greta Lynn) you will end up with squares that are blue, or red, or yellow, etc. If your pattern calls for mostly blue squares, the others are not going to fit into your design.

That doesn’t mean that these are not good and useful fabrics! One simple example is to combine one of these prints with one solid or near-solid contrasting fabric. Imagine 9-patches made with the rainbow dot against white. You would have a happy and colorful quilt from just these two fabrics.

Predictable Big Prints

Big prints are not always unpredictable and they are well worth using.

This wonderful fabric (on the left) is based on a pieced quilt, Tara’s Fireworks Quilt (fabric from Michael Miller). This cut is roughly fat-quarter-size.

You could use it as is, but it is easier to use in small pieces than you might think. The overall flavor of the print remains the same.

Let’s Compare:

Whether a fabric is predictable or unpredictable, always remember that the color, value, and scale of any print can only be measured against the fabrics they are paired with. A medium-scale print will look big when compared with solids and small prints.

Add an even bigger print, and the relationships change.

Adding prints with lines and stripes can help to visually control big and wild designs.

And, lastly, know that clear colors come forward and gray colors recede. So even though the big print, below, will be noticeable, the clear blues are more dominant.

Let's look at two completed quilts:

The only unpredictable fabric in this quilt is the dark gray/brown big print used in the log cabin centers and in the upper right hand triangles. You can’t see the big kitchen tools, but the shapes are cut big. I was careful to make the log cabin centers dark for continuity. I used a multi-colored stripe for the colorful inner and outer borders.

Improvisation by Becky Goldsmith
 

There’s a little bit of everything going on in Everyday Best. Many of the border backgrounds are cut from unpredictable fabrics that would not have cut up into consistent colors and/or values.

Everyday Best by Becky Goldsmith

 
Seeing Stars by Alex Anderson (Image courtesy by C&T Publishing. Free pattern Click Here) Lilith by Karen K. Stone (Image by TheQuiltShow.com)

Practice Exercise: Scrappy Sawtooth Stars

1. Gather a collection of fabrics together from your stash to include one as the background fabric. Your collection can be totally scrappy as in the case of Alex's quilt, Seeing Stars, on the left above or a more controlled color palate as Karen K. Stone's quilt, Lilith, on the right above.
2. Using the principles you have learned today, see how dynamic a collection you can pull together by including various print scale/size, patterns, and values.
3. Using your favorite Sawtooth Star Block pattern method, make at least six different blocks. With each succesive block, try to find a way to make the next block different than the one previous.

Click here for more topics related to The Art of Quilt Design program.

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We continue our feature on quilts from the Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA) exhibit, Layered & Stitched: Fifty Years of Innovation, as featured at the Texas Quilt Museum. The exhibit is described as:

Studio Art Quilt Associates presents Layered & Stitched: Fifty Years of Innovation at the Texas Quilt Museum in Galleries I and III. These studio art quilts, dating from 1968 to 2016, represent the extraordinary range of talented artists working in contemporary quilt art. Featuring a balance of abstract and representational styles, Layered & Stitched includes several foreign artists, with a wide geographic distribution of makers in general. The curatorial vision of this exhibition embraces diversity and excellence, including three-dimensional works. Juried by Nancy Bavor, Director of the San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles; Martha Sielman, Executive Director of SAQA; and Dr. Sandra Sider, Curator of the Texas Quilt Museum, who says, "Jurying this spectacular exhibition was one of the highlights of my career! It is an amazing show of historic significance."

The exhibit has also been collected in a companion book as well, titled Art Quilts Unfolding: 50 Years of Innovation by Nancy Bavor, Lisa Ellis, Martha Sielman, and edited by Sandra Sider. The book is described as: