Originally Posted by
dunster
I have the a similar problem with a well known paper piecing designer's patterns, but in reverse. She gives yardage amounts for each fabric, but identifies them as "medium background 1" and "medium background 2". I have no idea from looking at the pattern how to match these up with actual parts of the design. I wind up spending a lot of time matching up pattern pieces to the pattern, going to the pattern to find out what fabrics I'm supposed to use with those pieces, and developing my own diagram of where "medium background 1" belongs in the design. To make it worse, she will then mix up the terms, so what was once "medium dark" becomes "dark". Her designs are beautiful, and well worth the extra work to decipher the directions, but I just wish it were more clear to begin with.
DUNSTER - I wholeheartedly agree!!!!! A friend signed me up for a class with this particular paper piecing guru's pattern. I spend almost 2 hours with a WONDERFUL LQS owner who is great with fabrics and colors, and at the end, we had NO IDEA where in the pattern the 12 - 1/4 yard and 1/8 yard pieces went. Pattern was for a Hoffman collection back in 2013 - not colors I wanted to use, even if they WERE still available, which they are not. I agree that fabric designers want pattern makers to use their collections, but in addition to those, they need to understand that people buy the patterns long after the collections have finished their runs!!