Mimigram

Please give me some ideas for hand quilting a log cabin design. It is in mostly darker colors.

Hope2quilt

I have been looking at the log cabin design. It seems that one side is always light fabric and the other is light. Perhaps that is just what most people are doing on this board. I look at just about all the pictures to absorb ideas. I think the alternate of dark and light colors would look the best because it would show debth.

litacats

it is all a matter of choice. when I made my first log cabin I had 5 colours and just went round and round using each colour. it was only a lap quilt for my mum but it looked ok. I had a nice picture of a bird in the centre and used the colours from that.

Mimigram

This is a quilt that I am hand quilting for a friend. And you are right there are lighter fabrics on half of the log cabin squares. I just am unsure how to quilt the whole thing so that I do a good job for my friend. So far I have come up with random squares that intersect each other. Sound good?

litacats

have you sewn the squares together yet as the total look can change dramaticly I love the 4 squares that are joined so they make a larger square with all the light in the middle or vice versa.
a lot of quilters just do stitch in the ditch with the log cabins. it is very simple but affective, or maybe feathers they always look good.

Mimigram

The top is already done. I am hand quilting the log cabin quilt top.

gal288

I usually use the fabric to give me an idea of a quilting pattern when in doubt of what to do. Is there anything that stands out in the fabrics, ie: floral, shape, theme?

I also like to do either swirls or feathers when I do an geometric quilt block to ofset the lineal lines.

Can you post a photo of the quilt, it would be easier to suggest with a visual.

Prism99

Random intersecting squares sounds good, but have you considered how many seams you will have to cross? That is a major consideration with log cabin quilts.

If you are willing to cross that many seams, then I would suggest a circular pattern instead of a geometric; log cabin is a very geometric pattern and often benefits from the contrast of circular or flowing lines for the quilting. Many old log cabin quilts were hand quilted in the Baptist Fan pattern (concentric half-circles all over). I see a lot of log cabin quilts beautifully machine quilted with a feather pattern in the light areas (geometric or other pattern in the dark areas); however, that's probably not a good idea for hand quilting

Many hand quilters avoid the seams by quilting a line down the center of each log (or 1/4" inside each log, which is a lot more work). A variation of this which requires crossing some seams is to quilt a continuous geometric spiral starting with the center square and going out to the edge of the block.

dunster

I think that log cabins are traditionally hand quilted right beside the seam line, not using a fancy pattern because of all the seams that would have to be crossed. Even when quilted by machine, SID is pretty popular.

amma

Different layouts can bring different quilting patterns to mind. Can you post yours? :D:D:D