How to choose fabric for a pattern...
 

I have no idea how to do this. Don't want to use my bundles. Try to use up wayward fat quarters. Can some one come over a kit my fabric? Do I choose lights med and dark in one color way? Mix them all up? I just have too many choices on my cutting table and have no idea where to start. Thought if I had a Margareta it would clear the confusion.....NOPE!

Trying to make a pinwheel 36 x whatever.

rainbow colored quilts are popular right now. Make individual pinwheels of one color and arrange them based on what flow of colors you like. Example: If you have tons of green fabric, make tons of green pinwheels and let the colors flow gradation-wise. That would be an easy way to use up your leftover choices. Have another Margarita and my description might make sense.

Here is where I look for inspiration

https://colorpalettes.net/


I also pull fabric that has colors I like and use that to pull colors together. I have color wheels as well to help with my indecisiveness. Find pictures and use them as inspiration, get paint chips from paint stores, Lowes etc as they often have coordinated colors. I feel your pain, I struggle with color choices!

The paint chips idea is a very good idea. I have used that when stuck or to try to come up with a color scheme completely out of my comfort zone. Also using a favorite picture or painting and using colors from it. I also just pull fabrics and play with them. Sometimes I just search Pinterest for, say, “ blue and cream quilts’ to get an idea of what it looks like. A quilter who owned a fabric store once told me that gray goes with everything and that she often used it as a neutral to pull other colors together. Whatever you do, have fun with it! Best wishes on this endeavor. It truly can take time.

If using scraps I just put together in colors for girls or colors for boys. I make donation quilts so I don't know what color anyone likes.

Back in the days of quilt classes, I remember a teacher had use choose a focal fabric we like.....then we chose the addition color fabric using those little dots on the selvage. Background could be light or dark depending on other colors..

Hope this give you another idea. This even works if you decide not to use the original focal fabric, as you probably chose that fabric because your like the colors in it.

really kind of fun.

Judy in Phx, AZ

And when you are done at her house, I'll be waiting over here!

Make sure you take into account the values (pale through deep shades of a color) of colors. You can use the pattern sample as a guide. Choose your colors but you can be guided by the value with what the sample does. Or you can always reverse the light and darks in the sample. We tend to pick out vivid deep or medium tones neglecting the lights. You usually need all three to make the quilt interesting.

thanks for color palette link...good to know!
 

Thank you for the link for help on choosing colors!

I have used a fabric print I like to create a color palette. The work is already done for you. The designer has chosen the colors that work well together.

Yes, Tallchick … thank you for the color palette link. It is fun just to go through the different swatches.

Sometimes I print a black & white copy of the pattern picture, make a few copies, then get out my colored pencils and start coloring the picture to help me decide what colors I want to use

I make charity quilts and have a lot of small scraps left over. I sort them in two bins, one for larger pieces, one for smaller ones. Then I just pull them out randomly and start sewing them together into a crazy quilt square. I do this until I have enough sewn together to trim up to a 7" square. I do this until I have enough for a quilt, then I lay them out and pick a color I like and use that for sashing between the blocks. The sashing helps the quilt to not look too busy.

An easy way (for me) to collect fabrics for a quilt is to start with a focus fabric. One of those fabrics that I couldn't live without and had no idea how to use it. With yardage, I look to the dots in the selvage and start to pull from the stash. It is important to get lights, med. and darks. I always have a simple neutral in white, beige or grey. Don't lose contrast between the lights and the neutrals.

Use one constant fabric and use it in every block. For scraps I usually use a solid color for a constant.

My name is Judy also in Ft. Smith, AR

I use a color wheel and go from there. The other real good way for me is to pick the primary fabric and then coordinate that to different colors in the fabric. Works for me.

Oh, I wish I was closer to you guys. I love making more work for other people by kitting up fabrics. In my old guild when we had our big Ronald McDonald work weekends, that was often my station, putting together the fabric donations.

Right now I'm really trying to find ways to use large novelty prints because I happen to have a number of large novelty prints that need being used... I've found some good (and easy) setting techniques for collections of fabric that maybe don't connect well together but are a similar theme. Other times I look to see what I have in terms of strips or colors that need to be used. In my latest fabric reorganization round I find I have a full box that is getting too full of just solids. I'm hoping to use those this year in the Bonnie Hunter Mystery. All solids, but if there is a good choice for a consistent fabric, I'll probably pick a print for that and use it to pick the solids.

I used to agonize a lot over the best possible use for a piece of fabric. I've come to the conclusion that the best use is whatever use you can use it for!

TallChic; Bookmarked that site

Thanks for the site Tallchick. That will be really helpful. Lately, I've been doing a lot of scrappies and just using bright scraps. In the past, I've used system of picking a focus fabric and then go-with fabrics. It works well and is relatively easy.

I have also used the constant fabric that is in every block. I find that unifies the finished quilt nicely. Especially if I have enough to used it for borders or binding.

I make mostly scrap quilts and it doesn't always work, but I use the "everything including the kitchen sink" when it comes to putting colors together, so I'm not going to be very much helphttps://cdn.quiltingboard.com/images...es/redface.png

Lisa, thanks for the link!! :)

Another thank you to Tallchick for the link. Love the muted tones and color combinations. Got it bookmarked.

TYSM for all the ideas. I ended up using two partial jelly rolls to sew up pinwheels and square in a square blocks. Now to sort all the left over jelly rolls strips by color to make choosing colors for the next quilt. Wish me luck...lol

I'm a scrappy quilter, more often than not. You do have to pay attention to "value" in the fabric (how dark or light they are). Its the play of value that can make or break a quilt.

Rachel Hauser of Stitched in Color has a great book called "The Quilter's Field Guide to Color".

Quilter's Field Guide to Color

Jinny Beyer also has a color theory book that is more user-friendly than most.

Color Confidence for Quilters

hi Judy

nice to meet you 😊