I quilted off and on during my life, mostly off these last 10 years or so, and have recently come back to it. What I'm wondering is, how many people actually purchase and follow a pattern for a quilt? I have never used a pattern. Some times I look through books or mags for some design ideas, but most quilts are simple enough to do without patterns (squares, rectangles, triangles, etc...) so except for the most intricate ones, are patterns even really necessary? How often do you use them?
I have posted a quilt or two here and the first question that always pops up is: Where did you get that pattern? Do most people piece from patterns?