What Shade Are You: Rails {a finish}

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REPOSTING from RJR Fabrics “What Shade are You” Blog post today.
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Today, on “What Shade are You” I would like to share with you on my design journey and inspiration for my quilt “Rails”.

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I am Michelle Wilkie. I can be found on Instagram @ml_wilkie, or on my blog Factotum of Arts.

I was so excited to be participating in What Shade are you, and when I received my bundle in the mail a multitude of ideas came to mind. The colors are so vibrant.
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My original bundle, had a couple additional colors but the final fabrics I chose were:

Cotton Supreme Solids:
Optical White
Black
Turks & Caicos
Night
Electric Blue
Anemone
Citron
Sunny Delight
Tangerine Dream
Chilli Pepper
Grape
Shell pink
Raging Ruby

Additionally, I used some C+S fabrics to add some interest within the solids:
Sprinkle in Corduroy
Dottie in Fedora
Dottie Cousins in Natural

I get inspired all the time from the world around us. For this quilt, it was no different. My husband is from Mannheim Germany, where we both lived for a few years before moving to the US. My inspiration for this quilt came from the Neustheim Train Junction.

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The lines fascinated me. I loved the idea of using improvisation strip piecing to try and mimic these strong direction lines. It was an interesting experience bending the fabric to make the gentle curves. Some tips:

  1. I started this quilt at one end and added in one direction, using strips to mark out where I was adding curves that would intersect with other lines.
  2. Use a lot of starch to get the pieces to lay flat and press often.
  3. Make sure you trim your threads and additional fabric as you go, especially when using white.
  4. Lastly, I glue basted this quilt while it was on my design wall. I pressed each layer to fix it to the one beneath. This technique was important as it helped the top to adhere flat to the bottom layers and hold in place as it stretched out some of the puffy areas.

Here’s a close-up of the quilt top. The predominant colors are blues, yellows and white, however as I stepped back with each addition, I decided to add pops of colors. This adds balance and richness to this quilt that helped also break up the stark bands of color. You can see the use of red, purple, pinks, and orange.

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For the quilting, I used Aurifil 2410, 2021, 2120, and 2783. I used irregular-spaced wavy lines that flowed with the fabric strips, to complement the colors and design of the quilt. In the binding, I also added some interest and continued the flow of color by inserting a piece of C+S print and a small blue strip to my white binding.

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This was so much fun to play with such vibrant colors. I loved the overall finish that the Cotton Supreme Solids provided. Thanks to RJR fabrics for the opportunity and to you for stopping by.
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Stop by my RJRFabrics and ml_wilkie (on Instagram) for a giveaway later today.

19 thoughts on “What Shade Are You: Rails {a finish}”

  3. Karen

    WOW! Michelle, this quilt is incredible–the colors, the design, the sense of movement. And I am in awe of your source of inspiration–your take on it is so spot on. I love how your brain works 🙂

    Reply ↓
  8. Audrey

    Michelle, this looks amazing! Your lines and colors are gorgeous and full of movement. Excellent translation from photo to fabric.

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  13. Drew

    Absolutely incredible! !!You have a terrific design sense. Would love to see more of your work. I am in “Quilting” group on Facebook with women from all over the world and I know they would love to see your work.

    Reply ↓

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