I have a beautiful feathered cross pre-printed panel that I would like to use as a medallion for my queen-sized bed. I plan to use wool batting and look forward to handquilting it. I'm trying to think of ideas for the borders to enlarge it to the queen size that would accent but not overpower the simplicity of the center block which is about 36" square. Any ideas out there?

My only thoughts are possibly adding a rich-toned border & paperpiecing intricate-looking mariner stars with 'blank' off white squares between, or using a nice rich-toned border and doing simple nine patch blocks alternated with cream blank ones.

You can get some nice striped coordinating fabric and some other tone on tones and do several pieced borders around it. HSTs to make a nice saw tooth border, cut the striped into mitered corners to make a nice box, quarter square triangles, small stars...there's lots of different things you can do that would really set it off.

Thanks, Janice. I wasn't sure if there was a right or wrong way to incorporate a medallion into a full-sized quilt. If it would be more appropriate to stay with all cream-colors, or to add color. Guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder, huh? ;)

your idea sounds great!! solid color borders around the medallion first and then pieced blocks and more borders.